Adalberto Gonzalez, MD: Furthering the Safety of IBD Treatments

Safety is paramount for any treatment, particularly a fairly new class of treatments like biologics.

While infliximab first came on the market in 1998 for the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), in recent years there has been an explosion of new biologics to come on the market for the treatment of either Crohn’s disease or ulcerative colitis.

In an interview with HCPLive®, Adalberto J. Gonzalez, MD, a gastroenterologist with the Cleveland Clinic Florida, said while there is an absence of truly long-term safety data for many of the recent biologics, he is ultimately comfortable with the treatments for his patients.

“I am (comfortable with prescribing biologics,” Gonzalez said. “The thing is you have to kind of balance everything in medicine. Once you go into clinical practice you see that nothing is perfect. Do we know all the data on safety of biologics for inflammatory bowel disease? Maybe not, however there are significant risks in leaving inflammation unchecked.”

Gonzalez presented new data during the 2022 Digestive Disease Week Annual Meeting in San Diego showing biologics for the treatment of IBD and primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC) do not result in an increased risk of malignancies.

He said it continues to be important for investigators to continue to examine safety issues in this patient population, particularly to isolate any rare events that could occur.