Humira, Remicade?

I am about to start Humira. How do we know which Biologic is best? Is it trial and error? Is there a reason to choose one over the other? I know there are other Biologics, but these are the 2 I thought of at the moment. I am just concerned about which one is best. Thank you for any advice.

We have users who've received benefit from both humira and remicade. Humira and remicade are very similar biologics with very similar odds of helping improve your uc symptoms (about 60+ percent). Cost and convenience are often determining factors.

Both remicade and humira have copay assistance cards. They are ordered through specialty, mail-order pharmacies (express scripts, cvs caremark). Remicade is billed at $6,400 every 8 weeks, my insurance disallows half of that bill, reducing it to $3,200. I end up paying $5 for the medication after remistart pays the rest. I have to pay about $34 out of pocket for the visit to my specialist where the infusion is given.

Humira is a subcutaneous (just below the skin) self-injection you can do at home. Remicade is given at an infusion center (a hospital, some gastroenterologist offices) in a process that takes 2-3 hours.

Remicade has been approved the longest, giving it a longer safety profile and more patients using it. As humira is newer, it's 100 percent humanized (remi is 25 percent mouse protein) and therefore less likely to cause your body to develop antibodies that over time may make the medication less effective over time.

I'm in remission for the first time ever, thanks to remicade.

Remicade has a better response rate the first year but after 52 weeks they are even.

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/24491514/

I personally would start with Remicade, I liked it much better than Humira, Humira gave me annoying side effects of a constant dry mouth and I was always itchy(these are common side effects of Humira].

I liked Remicade, it worked really well for me.

I'm doing fine with Humira for my crohn's colitis, it also healed up my rectovaginal fistula which is bonus!! I still have to deal with IBS, too bad biologic's don't put IBS into remission as well. My side effects from Humira are pretty minor with a bit of itching after a hot shower and I explained in your other post about how antihistamines aid with the horrid Humira headaches which no longer affect me as I use the antihistamine on the day that I do my Humira shot.

Usually Benadryl helps with reactions to Humira and Remicade. It helped with the itching and headaches that I got from Humira, it didn't help with the dry mouth which I needed a mouthwash for.

Remicade has the same type of co-pay assistance, they do it so patients take these expensive meds, they really want the insurance companies 80%-90% of their share of the costs, not the patients 10%-20%. I'm sure many of us couldn't pay for it and wouldn't take these meds if the costs were not subsides by the manufactures.