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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2024 Aug 1.
Published in final edited form as: Pharmacol Ther. 2023 Jun 10;248:108476. doi: 10.1016/j.pharmthera.2023.108476

Table 1.

Overview of immunotherapies targeting pro-inflammatory cytokines in chronic pain related conditions.

Cytokine Principle Immunotherapy Chronic pain
conditions		 Pain related positive
and negative outcomes		 References
TNF-α Anti-TNF-α Infliximab Adalimumab Golimumab Certolizumab-pegol Etanercept Ozoralizumab Rheumatoid arthritis; Psoriatic arthritis; Ankylosing spondylitis; Certolizumab-pegol treatment (12 weeks) reduced pain VAS score in psoriatic arthritis patients. Ozoralizumab treatment (24 weeks) reduced pain in VAS score in rheumatoid arthritis patients. (Esposito, et al., 2020; Gholami, Azizpoor, Aflaki, Rezaee, & Keshavarz, 2021; Oldfield & Plosker, 2009; Takeuchi, Kawanishi, Nakanishi, Yamasaki, & Tanaka, 2022)
IL-1β Anti-IL-1β Canakinumab Rheumatoid arthritis; Systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis; Recurrent Pericarditis; Traumatic brain injury/stroke; Covid-19; In the withdrawal phase of canakinumab treatment (32 weeks), serious adverse arm pain occurred in 1 patient with systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis out of 50 patients. Anakinra treatment (24 weeks) improved rheumatoid arthritis pain symptom. Rilonacept treatment (6 weeks) in recurrent pericarditis patients reduced average pericarditis pain. (Fava, et al., 2022; Helmy, et al., 2014; Kyriazopoulou, et al., 2021; Maniscalco, et al., 2020; Orrock & Ilowite, 2016)
Anti-IL-1R Anakinra Rilonacept
IL-6 Anti-IL-6 Siltuximab Clazakizumab Olokizumab Sirukumab Psoriatic arthritis; Rheumatoid arthritis; Juvenile idiopathic arthritis; Giant cell arteritis; Covid-19; Tocilizumab treatment (24-52 weeks) improved pain VAS score in rheumatoid arthritis patients. Sarilumab treatment (2-52 weeks) showed improvements in pain VAS score in rheumatoid arthritis patients. (Mease, et al., 2016; Tanaka, Narazaki, & Kishimoto, 2018; Vaidya, et al., 2020)
Anti-IL-6R Tocilizumab Sarilumab
IL-17 Anti-IL-17A Secukinumab Ixekizumab Psoriatic arthritis; Ankylosing Spondylitis; Secukinumab treatment (12-52 weeks) in patients with psoriatic arthritis showed greater improvements in the axial specific assessment of spinal pain. (Baeten, et al., 2015; J. X. Huang, Lee, & Wei, 2020; Langley, et al., 2014; Lespessailles & Toumi, 2021)
GM-CSF Anti-GM-CSF Namilumab Otilimab Rheumatoid arthritis; Psoriasis; Giant cell arteritis; Covid-19; Namilumab treatment (12-16 weeks) in rheumatoid arthritis patients had improvements inpatient’s assessment of pain. Mavrilimumab treatment caused non-specific headache and neck pain in patients with giant cell arteritis. (Crotti, Agape, Becciolini, Biggioggero, & Favalli, 2019) (Pourhoseingholi, Shojaee, & Ashtari, 2020)
Anti-GM-CSFR Mavrilimumab