Key clinical point: Stratifying patients based on the presence or absence of the shared epitope (SE) on the HLA-DRB1 allele could help biologic choice in early RA.

Major finding: Numerically higher percentages of patients with the SE who were treated with abatacept achieved 20%, 50%, or 70% improvement in American College of Rheumatology response criteria (ACR20, 50, 70), compared with adalimumab.

Study details: The Early AMPLE study – a 24-week, multinational, randomized, prospective, head-to-head, single-blind, phase 4 trial of 80 patients with biologic naive, seropositive, early RA treated with abatacept or adalimumab.

Disclosures: Bristol-Myers Squibb sponsored the study. Dr. Bykerk disclosed receiving grant or research support paid to her institution from BMS, as well as Amgen and UCB. She also disclosed acting as a consultant to BMS and multiple other pharmaceutical companies. Several coauthors were employees and shareholders in BMS, or had acted as consultants to BMS.