Vedolizumab for the Management of Refractory Behçet’s Disease: From a Case Report to New Pieces of Mosaic in a Complex Disease

Abstract

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ObjectivesWhen treating Behçet’s disease (BD), anti-tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α agents have become a second-line therapy when conventional immunosuppressive drugs have failed. However, in the case of failure of treatment with anti-TNFα drugs, further options are limited. Based on previous reports of the efficacy of vedolizumab (VDZ) in inflammatory bowel diseases, we decided to administer VDZ to treat a patient with intestinal BD.MethodsWe present the case of a 49-year-old female patient with BD. Her clinical manifestations included erythema nodosum, oro-genital ulcers, positive Pathergy test, positive HLA-B51, and biopsy-proven intestinal BD. The patient was unsuccessfully treated with conventional immunosuppressive and several biological agents.ResultsTreatment with VDZ was started intravenously at a dose of 300 mg at 0, 2, and 6 weeks and then every 4 weeks. After the second dose of VDZ, the patient reported a marked improvement of intestinal BD and a concomitant amelioration of arthralgia, erythema nodosum lesions and aphthosis. Clinical remission was achieved at 6 months after starting VDZ.ConclusionVDZ might represent a valid option to treat patients with BD who are non-responsive to standard treatments or anti-TNFα agents, particularly, those cases with intestinal involvement.

Keywords

• vedolizumab
• Behçet disease
• biological drug
• intestinal Behçet
• biological therapy