Are there predictors of Remicade treatment success or failure?

Infliximab (Remicade®) is an antitumor necrosis factor (TNF) therapy effective in both induction and maintenance of remission in Crohn's disease. Identifying predictors of response or relapse to infliximab is important given the potential toxicities and cost of this therapy. Currently available data suggest that concurrent immunosuppressant therapy, certain clinical characteristics, biological and immunological markers, and gene polymorphism may correlate with response to infliximab. However, no single variable has been consistently shown or definitely proven in studies to be a predictor of response to infliximab to be of practical value in current clinical practice. Data from the literature in these areas are reviewed in this article, pointing to the need for additional research in this topic.