SynthesisPloS one2019
Cardiovascular safety of tocilizumab: A systematic review and network meta-analysis.
Synthesis in PloS one, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 45 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
45 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 77 citations in OpenAlex.
- Effect of disease modifying anti-rheumatic drugs on major cardiovascular events: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.Scientific reports · 2021Pooled it
- Association of Serum IL-6 (Interleukin 6) With Functional Outcome After Intracerebral Hemorrhage.Stroke · 2021Trial
- Tocilizumab for severe and refractory mucous membrane pemphigoid.Journal of the European Academy of Dermatology and Venereology : JEADV · 2026Article
- Article
- Positive and Negative Cardiovascular Effects of JAK Inhibitors in Inflammation.ACR open rheumatology · 2026Review
- Immunophenotypes and prognosis in autoimmune cardiovascular disease: a narrative review from clonal hematopoiesis to myocarditis, microvascular angina, and HFpEF.Annals of medicine and surgery (2012) · 2026Review
- Heart Failure in Rheumatoid Arthritis: Epidemiology, Pathogenesis, Diagnosis, Treatment, and Emerging Insights-A Comprehensive Review.Medicina (Kaunas, Lithuania) · 2026Review
- Frontiers in Rheumatoid Arthritis: Emerging Research and Unmet Needs in Pharmacologic Management.Pharmaceuticals (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Myocardial work abnormalities in rheumatoid arthritis with preserved left ventricular ejection fraction are more closely related to disease activity than to disease duration: a prospective cross-sectional study.Frontiers in medicine · 2026Article
- Efficacy and field safety of ilunocitinib for the control of atopic dermatitis in client-owned dogs: A multicentre, double-masked, randomised, placebo-controlled clinical trial.Veterinary dermatology · 2025Article
- A Comprehensive Review: Unraveling the Role of Inflammation in the Etiology of Heart Failure.Heart failure reviews · 2025Review
- Comparative safety of biologic and targeted synthetic disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs for cardiovascular outcomes in rheumatoid arthritis.Rheumatology (Oxford, England) · 2025Article
- Tocilizumab unfolds colo-protective and immunomodulatory effect in experimentally induced ulcerative colitis via mitigating autophagy and ER stress signaling.Inflammopharmacology · 2024Article
- Interleukin-6: Cardiovascular Aspects of Long-Term Cytokine Suppression in Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis.International journal of molecular sciences · 2024Article
- Treating Cardiovascular Disease in the Inflammatory Setting of Rheumatoid Arthritis: An Ongoing Challenge.Biomedicines · 2024Review
- Global Perspective on COVID-19 Therapies, Cardiovascular Outcomes, and Implications for Long COVID: A State-of-the-Art Review.Journal of community hospital internal medicine perspectives · 2024Review
- Risk of incident cardiovascular events with disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs among adults with rheumatoid arthritis: a nested case-control study.Clinical rheumatology · 2024Article
- Impact of IL6R genetic variants on treatment efficacy and toxicity response to sarilumab in rheumatoid arthritis.Arthritis research & therapy · 2023Article
- Current Medical Therapy and Revascularization in Peripheral Artery Disease of the Lower Limbs: Impacts on Subclinical Chronic Inflammation.International journal of molecular sciences · 2023Review
- Therapeutic Antibodies in Medicine.Molecules (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivesOur objective was to compare the cardiovascular safety of tocilizumab and other biological disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (bDMARD) in rheumatoid arthritis using a network meta-analysis (NMA).
methodsA systematic literature search through May 2018 identified randomized controlled trials (RCT) or observational studies (cohort only) reporting cardiovascular outcomes of tocilizumab (TCZ) and/or abatacept (ABA) and/or rituximab (RTX) and/or tumor necrosis factor inhibitors (TNFi) in rheumatoid arthritis patients. The composite primary outcome was the rate of major adverse cardiovascular outcomes (MACE, myocardial infarction (MI), peripheral artery disease (PAD) and cardiac heart failure (CHF)).
results19 studies were included in the NMA, including 11 RCTs and 8 cohort studies. We found less events with RTX (5.41 [1.70;17.26]. We found no difference between TCZ and other treatments. Concerning MI, we found no difference between TCZ and csDMARD (4.23 [0.22;80.64]), no difference between TCZ and TNFi (2.00 [0.18;21.84]). There was no difference between TCZ and csDMARD (1.51[0.02;103.50] and between TCZ and TNFi (1.00 [0.06;15.85]) for stroke event. With cohorts and RCT NMA, we found no difference between TCZ and other treatments for MACE (0.66 [0.42;1.03] with ABA, 1.04 [0.60;1.81] with RTX, 0.78[0.53;1.16] and 0.91 [0.54;1.51] with csDMARD), but the risk of myocardial infarction was lower with TCZ compared to ABA (0.67 [0.47;0.97]). We lacked data to compare TCZ and other bDMARD for stoke and MI. Not enough data was available to perform a NMA for CHF and PAD.
conclusionsDespite an increase in cholesterol levels, TCZ has safe cardiovascular outcomes compared to other bDMARD.
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What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.