ArticleRheumatology and therapy2021
TNF-α Blockers Showed Prophylactic Effects in Preventing COVID-19 in Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis and Seronegative Spondyloarthropathies: A Case-Control Study.
Article in Rheumatology and therapy, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 15 papers.
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Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 27 citations in OpenAlex.
- Article
- Article
- Ultra-Low-Dose Inhalation of Melphalan as an Additional Treatment for COVID-19-Associated Pneumonia.Journal of clinical medicine · 2025Article
- Secondary metabolites of Alternaria alternate appraisal of their SARS-CoV-2 inhibitory and anti-inflammatory potentials.PloS one · 2025Article
- Review
- Cardioprotective effects of vaccination in hospitalized patients with COVID-19.Clinical and experimental medicine · 2024Article
- Photobiomodulation Reduces the Cytokine Storm Syndrome Associated with COVID-19 in the Zebrafish Model.International journal of molecular sciences · 2023Article
- Prospective Roles of Tumor Necrosis Factor-Alpha (TNF-α) in COVID-19: Prognosis, Therapeutic and Management.International journal of molecular sciences · 2023Review
- Biological and Exploitable Crossroads for the Immune Response in Cancer and COVID-19.Biomedicines · 2022Review
- Adapted tensor decomposition and PCA based unsupervised feature extraction select more biologically reasonable differentially expressed genes than conventional methods.Scientific reports · 2022Article
- Molecular signaling pathways, pathophysiological features in various organs, and treatment strategies in SARS-CoV2 infection.Acta histochemica · 2022Review
- Favorable vaccine-induced SARS-CoV-2-specific T cell response profile in patients undergoing immune-modifying therapies.The Journal of clinical investigation · 2022Article
- Blocking TNF signaling may save lives in COVID-19 infection.Molecular biology reports · 2022Review
- Application of Monoclonal Antibody Drugs in Treatment of COVID-19: a Review.BioNanoScience · 2022Review
- Possible therapeutic targets for SARS-CoV-2 infection and COVID-19.Journal of allergy and infectious diseases · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
introductionThe interaction between angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) and SARS-CoV-2 is a crucial factor in the viral infections leading to the release of inflammatory proteins, such as TNF-α. Thus, it is hypothesized that TNF-α blockers can prevent either COVID-19 incidence or its serious symptoms. TNF-α blockers are prescribed to treat various autoimmune disorders, including rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and seronegative spondyloarthropathies (SpA). Therefore, the objective of this work was to examine this hypothesis that TNF-α blockers can prevent COVID-19 incidence in patients with RA or SpA.
methodsA case-control study was conducted through interviews based on a structured questionnaire to investigate the frequency of COVID-19 incidence in 254 eligible patients with RA or SpA about whom 45% were under treatment with one type of TNF-α blockers including infliximab, adalimumab, and etanercept at least for 3 months during the COVID-19 pandemic. Interviews were carried out twice, at the beginning and the end of the study (June-December 2020). Patients with COVID-19 during the study or before that were considered as cases. The control group was patients without COVID-19 experience. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, and logistic regression was used to determine the relationships between COVID-19 incidence and independent variables.
resultsA small percentage of patients treated with TNF-α blockers (5.22%, 6/115) experienced COVID-19, while a large percentage of patients with COVID-19 did not receive TNF-α blockers (27.34%, 38/139). According to odds ratio, adalimumab, infliximab, and etanercept decreased significantly the risk of developing COVID-19 up to 96.8, 95, and 80.3% (p < 0.05), respectively. Therefore, TNF-α blockers could probably decrease the chances of the COVID-19 incidence in patients with RA or SpA.
conclusionsA direct and positive correlation between the use of TNF-α blockers and a reduction in the incidence of COVID-19 could suggest the prophylactic role of these drugs in preventing COVID-19 in patients with RA and SpA.
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