In this AJMC Insights episode, Angela Lamb discusses how clinicians diagnose and assess atopic dermatitis using clinical scoring tools and patient-centered goal setting, emphasizing the importance of evaluating both disease severity and patient-reported symptoms to guide individualized treatment decisions.
Angela Lamb examined the real-world challenges of capturing patient-reported outcomes in clinical practice, noting that while standardized pre-visit assessments and long-term tracking of quality of life and itch scores are theoretically ideal, implementation barriers such as varying electronic medical record (EMR) systems and competing clinical demands make consistent adoption difficult outside of clinical trial settings.
Angela Lamb discussed how the lack of robust head-to-head comparative data across interleukin-targeting biologics contributes to biologic cycling, noting that without clear guidance on which agent best matches a given patient's immunologic drivers, clinician decision-making often relies on phenotype and clinical experience rather than predictive data.
Angela Lamb discussed how advanced therapy selection — spanning interleukin-4 (IL-4), IL-13, and IL-31 inhibitors as well as oral Janus kinase (JAK) inhibitors — is guided by patient phenotype, age-based restrictions, disease severity, and whether the presentation is more itch-dominant or body surface area (BSA)-dominant rather than a one-size-fits-all approach.
Angela Lamb discussed the switching data from the LEVEL UP trial, noting that patients who had not met treatment goals on dupilumab and switched to upadacitinib were able to achieve meaningful improvements, reinforcing the message to patients that failure on one biologic does not preclude success with another.
