DAVID PARISER, MD: What is new and exciting for patients with psoriasis and for the physicians who treat them is we now have a new class of biologic drugs which have been specifically developed and engineered to treat psoriasis by specifically targeting the defective immune response, and this will give both physicians and their patients a wider choice of medications in order to help them treat the disease.
ANNOUNCER: Unlike traditional treatments, biologics work by treating not just symptoms but by getting to the core problem of abnormal T-cell activity, thus modifying the disease process itself.
DAVID PARISER, MD: In order to develop the skin lesions of psoriasis, there has to be an activation of the T-cell by an antigen-presenting cell. The T-cell is the actor that produces the inflammation through release of cytokines and various other substances. Biologics work by blocking the interaction of the antigen-presenting cell and the T-cell, or by blocking the inflammatory cytokines that's the product of the T-cells after they have been elaborated.
KENNETH GORDON, MD: Remissions in psoriasis can be induced by deactivating the T-cells, the primary immune cells that cause psoriasis. And by eliminating these cells and reducing their activity, hopefully patients will attain long-term remissions of their disease.
ANNOUNCER: Biologic therapy could be a welcome departure from other treatment options.
