Efficacy of Baricitinib in Patients With Various Degrees of Alopecia Areata Severity: Results From Brave-AA1 and Brave-AA2

The document presents the results of two phase 3 randomized, double-blinded, placebo-controlled trials (BRAVE-AA1 with 654 participants and BRAVE-AA2 with 546 participants) that evaluated the efficacy of Baricitinib, an oral selective Janus kinase (JAK)1/JAK2 inhibitor, in adult patients with varying degrees of alopecia areata (AA) severity. The severity was measured using the Severity of Alopecia Tool (SALT) score. The primary efficacy endpoint was the proportions of patients achieving a SALT score ≤20 at week 36. The results showed that both 2mg and 4mg doses of Baricitinib were significantly superior to placebo in achieving hair regrowth (SALT ≤20) across all severity subgroups at week 36. Specifically, for severe AA, 32.7% of patients on 2mg and 47.6% on 4mg achieved this, compared to 7.8% on placebo. For very severe AA, the figures were 9.8% and 21.3% versus 0.6%, and for alopecia universalis, they were 19.6% and 27.7% versus 2.9%.