Off-Label JAK Inhibitors and New Drugs in the Dermatology Pipeline, With Gabriela Maloney, DO

Following her session on off-label Janus-kinase (JAK)-inhibitor use at the 2025 Society of Dermatology Physician Associates (SDPA) Fall Conference in San Antonio, Gabriela Maloney, DO, of Forefront Dermatology, spoke in an interview with HCPLive.1

Maloney’s interview focused on the comparative safety and efficacy of JAK inhibitors in dermatology, contrasting them with such options as systemic steroids and methotrexate. JAK inhibitors, Maloney noted, have a lower incidence of severe side effects.

“When you compare it to side effects of chronic systemic steroid use, Cushing’s syndrome, hyperglycemia, diabetes, hypertension, osteoporosis, osteonecrosis, you name it, those side effects pale in comparison,” Maloney said. “Also, when you look at methotrexate, it is a chemotherapy drug with which we're inhibiting DNA synthesis in the entire system. It has pulmonary toxicity, renal toxicity, bone marrow toxicity, so a lot of other concerns that can happen as well.”

Despite the lack of head-to-head research on the safety of JAK inhibitors with these 2 drugs, Maloney believes the incidence of side effects should be discussed and should be considered by clinicians. Later, she highlighted drugs such as abrocitinib (Cibinqo) as helpful in the treatment of conditions like vitiligo and hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) without significant lipid alterations or weight gain.

“I think one that's really a hot topic right now is upadacitinib, or Rinvoq,” Maloney explained. “There's a lot of trials going on for this, for vitiligo and HS as well. So hopefully we'll have more availability pretty soon...Abrocitinib or Cibinqo is a great option as well. And the nice thing about Cibinqo is that it doesn't bind to JAK2, so we really don't have the some of the lipid alterations or the weight gain."

To learn more about topics in dermatology presented at the 2025 SDPA Fall Conference, view our site’s latest conference coverage.

The quotes used in this session summary were edited for the purposes of clarity.

References

1. Maloney G. Off-Label Usage of JAK Inhibitors. Presented at the Society of Dermatology Physician Associates (SDPA) Fall Conference, November 5-9, San Antonio, TX.