From joint pains to hair gains: baricitinib’s double duty for rheumatoid arthritis and alopecia areata

Personalised medicine is a key goal across medical specialties today: using biomarkers and knowledge of pathophysiology to ensure the right patients get the right treatment. This becomes more challenging when patients have more than one disease requiring a targeted treatment. Autoimmune diseases commonly co-occur, and thus, multidisciplinary working is important in rheumatology. We present a case where a patient with a new diagnosis of alopecia areata on a background of rheumatoid arthritis was successfully treated with baricitinib monotherapy, with improvement in both conditions.