In this medical chart review of US patients with ankylosing spondylitis, approximately one-third of patients (34.6%) were biologic naïve, and another 53.8% of patients had received only one biologic prior to initiating secukinumab, suggesting that rheumatologists are prescribing secukinumab early in the treatment algorithm when considering biologic therapy.

The most common reasons for secukinumab initiation among biologic-naïve and biologic-experienced patients, respectively, were efficacy/effectiveness of secukinumab (77.8%) and failure of other prior biologics (84.3%).

These findings will provide information to rheumatologists on how secukinumab is used by their peers for the treatment of ankylosing spondylitis in US clinical practice.