Milestones in combinatorial therapies

The Work Package 6 of the DocTIS Project focuses its efforts in evaluating the combinatorial therapies in animal models of the different IMID’s and compare them to the approved monotherapies. To this purpose, the laboratory of Dr. Pere Santamaria has established five different mouse models for Rheumatoid Arthritis, Crohn’s Disease, Ulcerative Colitis, Systemic Lupus Erythematosus and Psoriasis. The IDIBAPS group has established the various models and has tested the monotherapies as well as the combinatorial therapies in some of the models.  

Interestingly, the psoriasis mouse model results point towards a beneficial effect of the combinatorial therapies under study. In the IBD models, on the other hand, combinatorial therapies are not consistently better. Whereas in Ulcerative Colitis, combinatorial therapy appears to halt disease progression, in a spontaneous mouse model of Crohn’s Disease, combinatorial therapy do not appear to afford therapeutic
benefit over the approved monotherapies. In some cases, there appear to be worse outcomes. Although these results are preliminary, they offer insights of translational significance.