Treatment of moderate-to-severe alopecia areata in patients over the age of 65 with baricitinib

Gia Toan Tang; Daranporn Triwongwaranat; Rodney Sinclair; Shoba Joseph; Samantha Eisman; Deepani Rathnayake; Vanathy Varathan; Lara Trindade de Carvalho; Bevin Bhoyrul

doi:10.1093/ced/llae033

Treatment of moderate-to-severe alopecia areata in patients over the age of 65 with baricitinib

Clin Exp Dermatol. 2024 Jan 25:llae033. doi: 10.1093/ced/llae033. Online ahead of print.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, Australia.
² Sinclair Dermatology, East Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
³ Department of Dermatology, Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University, Bangkok, Thailand.

PMID: 38270233
DOI: 10.1093/ced/llae033

Abstract

Baricitinib is a Janus kinase inhibitor which is now FDA approved for the treatment of severe alopecia areata (AA) in adults. However, the clinical trials which demonstrated the efficacy of baricitinib in the treatment of severe AA did not include men aged >60 years and women aged >70 years. We retrospectively assessed the efficacy and safety of baricitinib in 14 patients aged ≥65 years with moderate-to-severe AA. After a mean (SD) duration of 18.5 (11.9) months, a 72.0% reduction in the mean SALT score from baseline was observed. Partial or complete eyebrow and eyelash hair was observed in 57.1% and 42.9% of patients respectively. Adverse effects of baricitinib were mild. No cases of venous thromboembolism (VTE), major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE) or malignancy were reported.