Clinical Information

Adalimumab, sold under the brand names Amjevita and Humira, is a medication used to treat rheumatoid arthritis, psoriatic arthritis, Crohn disease, ulcerative colitis, chronic psoriasis, amongst others. Adalimumab is a tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-inhibiting, antiinflammatory, biologic medication. It binds to TNF-alpha, which normally binds to TNF-alpha receptors, leading to the inflammatory response of autoimmune diseases. By binding to TNF-alpha, adalimumab reduces inflammatory response. Because TNF-alpha is also part of the immune system that protects the body from infection, treatment with adalimumab may increase the risk of infections. Treatment with adalimumab is effective in reducing disease activity, offers significant benefits in quality of life, and may have the potential to slow or halt the progression of the disease when given early. However, over 30% of patients fail to respond to anti-TNF-alpha therapy, and approximately 60% of patients who responded initially lose the response over time and require either drug dose-escalation or switch to an alternative therapy in order to maintain response.(1)

This assay has been verified to measure the reference product adalimumab (Humira, AbbVie) and the biosimilar adalimumab-atto (Amjevita, Amgen) with no analytical differences in the quantitation of the medications. Humira and Amjevita have the same primary amino acid sequence. Therefore, adalimumab will be used to refer to both the reference product and the biosimilar product interchangeably. This test cannot distinguish between Humira and the adalimumab biosimilar product.

Reasons for primary loss of response are not well understood but may include disease processes mediated by proinflammatory molecules other than TNF. Secondary loss of response, on the other hand, is associated with low serum albumin, high body-mass index, the degree of systemic inflammation and development of an immune response to therapy, or immunogenicity.(2,3) Antidrug antibody formation may increase drug clearance in treated patients or neutralize the drug effect, thereby potentially contributing to the loss of response. Antidrug antibodies could also cause adverse events such as serum sickness and hypersensitivity reactions.(4) Currently, adalimumab quantitation is commonly performed in conjunction with immunogenicity assessment for antibodies to adalimumab (ATA). Most often, this testing is ordered in patients on therapy who are experiencing partial or complete loss of response.

TNF inhibitor therapies are expensive and adverse events include greater risk for infections, such as reactivation of latent tuberculosis or hepatitis B, infusion or injection site reactions, cutaneous reactions, and reports of hepatoxicity, demyelinating disease, and higher incidence of mortality and hospitalization in heart failure patients have been documented.