What you need to know about Humira (adalimumab) and Enbrel (etanercept) for Autoimmune Conditions.
Hey guys so in today’s video i wanted to talk about humera and ambrel so the reason why i’m putting these two meds into one video is because literally i would just end up like if i did a separate video they would be the exact same thing just take embroil out and put humera and instead as usual i will put the long names for these two in the comments and description
Because yeah we’re not about to try and pronounce those okay um that said i had made a video already about how i gave myself the humira pen injection so if you’re looking for like how to how someone gives themselves the auto injector pen um for humera that’s a separate video but what both of these are is they are both biologics so these are medications that
Work differently from like the methotrexate and like plaquenil you know self-establishing and like those kind of those demards and that these end up having to in humira and ambrose case there’s no pill form in order for it to work it has to go into the fatty tissue so you would give it to yourself similar to how like you know people with diabetes give themselves
Insulin okay so humira and embryo treat a bunch of different autoimmune things you know it’s not just rheumatoid arthritis i’ve seen it also for you know crohn’s i’ve seen a full slurry of colitis i’ve seen it for lupus i’ve seen it for you know all the different subtypes of the juvenile idiopathic arthritis you know i’ve seen it for a bunch and so with these
Medications like i said you only have the shot form but you get to choose between what’s called a pre-filled syringe and an auto-injecting pen so pre-filled syringe is basically when the medication is already in there and you have to give yourself the shot and then the other one is same thing except it’s in an auto injector pen form now i already made a video
And i’ll put a card up um going over the differences and how to figure out which one would be um your preference as far as how you want those to how you want to give yourself those medications um but as far as how long these takes to work it’s different for everybody i’ve seen some people who are new to biologics like it’s their very first medication and they
Feel a difference as soon as they get the shot i’ve seen some people who it takes a few doses for them to start to feel a difference i’ve seen some people take up the three months and i’ve seen some people take up to six months for it to start working now for me personally with humera it wasn’t what my body needed so after three months i didn’t feel any sort of
Difference but i’ve seen it work wonders with a lot of other people so with that said i like to remind you everyone’s body is different so with the common side effects with the um embryo and the humera is that just like the dmards they can bring down your um you know calms down your immune system so with that said if you end up you know just like with all having
These conditions and being on these meds you know there is a there is a higher chance that you could get an infection and that’s the case whether you’re on these meds or if you’re on nomads because your immune system is just not working properly otherwise we would we wouldn’t you know we wouldn’t be in the rheumatology realm you know and the one consideration
That i like to mention with the humera and the embryo these medications have to be refrigerated and they’re considered specialty meds so what that means is you can’t just go and walk down to your knees you’re near cvs or walgreens or whatever your in-person pharmacy is and go and pick these up don’t work that way these are specialized meds so they have to come
From a specialty pharmacy and the way that usually happens is you have to get insurance approval um for them to pay for it and then your insurance company usually has a specialty pharmacy that they work with so like some of them are like cbs specialty pharmacy or optimarx uh i don’t know if briovarx exists or if they blend it in with optumrx um you know but
Specialty pharmacies that will mail the medication out to you and it will come in refrigerated and for storage purposes you need to keep it in the fridge because otherwise that medication ain’t going basically if it sits out for too long it could spoil now when you go to give it to yourself it’s totally fine to leave it in room temperature i was told for like you
Know 30 minutes to an hour or whatnot so it’s not cold when you give it to yourself but as far as like keeping these medications in that’s usually how it goes bless you mike bless you my cat has allergies anyway um so and then and then another thing as far as how often these are given it varies the average for most people is every other week so just one time
Every other week you would give yourself these meds or someone else will give it to you there are some people who have a unique situation where they would need one like every week um but that’s not what i’ve seen the most and that’s not what i personally experienced with humera it was just one shot every other week i also noticed that some people do end up tired
When they give themselves these shots and so that wasn’t my experience but one thing that helped especially when i was working with the kiddos um taking it like the day of or the day before and off day so that way if you’re tired it’s not like oh my gosh i gotta go to school oh my gosh i gotta go to work that seems to help offset that if it ends up making you
Tired initially um again since you’re not taking it in pill form um you don’t really hear much about like upset stomach and then the last thing too i want to mention because these are biologics um in general it’s not recommended to get any live vaccines on these medications so for most of us adults we’ve been past that because those are the ones that you end up
Getting when you’re little you know your chickenpox your measles mumps rubella like those that you get really little usually those are live so anytime it comes to a vaccine always ask and make sure highly recommend that it is an inactive or it is not live because what happens is for some people if you happen to be one of the few that is sensitive to it if you
Get a live vaccine you can actually like get sick and i don’t mean like immune response i mean like you actually get it and uh we don’t want that so uh just that something i like to throw out there especially with biologics um because there are there are some kiddos you know that that get it too you know and if or if you end up having to do a catch-up series on
Something you know for school or whatever just make sure that you know if there’s a place that’s requiring a live vaccine make sure that you have a you know talk to your doctor so they can figure out the best way for you guys to explain that situation because it’s generally a no anyway that sums up humira nimble okay so i hope this was helpful for you guys and
If you have any questions let me know see you in the next video bye
Transcribed from video
Humira and Enbrel for Autoimmune Conditions | What's Important to Know By Orlea in the Rheum
