Living with a chronic immune-mediated disease can often mean planning life around symptoms–wondering what you’ll need to adjust or what you may have to miss.^1-5 As the field of Immunology has rapidly advanced, many people and their healthcare professionals (HCPs) are redefining care goals.

As we approach the 2026 American Academy of Dermatology (AAD) Annual Meeting, Jeffrey Stark, MD, Vice President & US Head of Medical Immunology at UCB, and Donatello Crocetta, Chief Medical Officer & Global Head of Medical at UCB, share perspectives shaped by close collaboration with healthcare providers, advocacy groups, and people living with immune-mediated inflammatory diseases.

Drawing on deep scientific and clinical experience, they reflect on how evolving expectations–around fast and lasting symptom control, earlier diagnosis and treatment, achieving meaningful outcomes, and quality of life–are influencing conversations in Immunology, and how these insights are guiding efforts to advance patient‑centered care.

What have you learned from working closely with patients and providers across the Immunology community?

Donatello Crocetta: When I speak with people living with immune-mediated diseases like psoriasis and hidradenitis suppurativa (HS), what stays with me most is how disruptive these conditions can be.^1-4 HS isn’t just physically painful; the stigma can make people withdraw from work, school, or even discourage people from seeking treatment.^{1-2,6-8 P}soriasis can be just as debilitating in ways that aren’t always visible, affecting emotional well-being as much as it affects the skin.^3-5 

That is why I think it is so important to keep coming back to our ambition at UCB: to create solutions that make a meaningful difference in people’s lives and help them live a life less burdened by inflammatory diseases. I’ve learned that many people are searching for steadier, more reliable control of their symptoms–outcomes that support greater predictability and fewer interruptions to everyday life.

How are expectations for care evolving in psoriasis, and what is UCB doing to keep up with these advances?

Dr. Stark: Expectations for care are evolving in lockstep with science, and UCB is constantly striving to advance the future of care and support progress toward outcomes that matter.

Increasingly, people living with immune-mediated disease and their HCPs are discussing care goals that reflect lasting symptom control. In moderate-to-severe plaque psoriasis, that means aiming higher at targets like the National Psoriasis Foundation’s (NPF) consensus‑based definition of on‑treatment remission for plaque psoriasis, which defines on-treatment remission as maintaining Body Surface Area (BSA) 0% or an Investigator's Global Assessment (IGA) score of 0 for at least 6 months while on treatment.⁹ NPF developed the consensus definition in August 2025 to facilitate shared understanding, align treatment expectations around more stringent outcomes, and enable more effective psoriasis management.⁹ For people with psoriasis, the definition translates to skin that is clear of plaques for at least 6 months while on treatment.9 For patients, maintaining complete skin clearance is important in reducing psoriasis burden and improving quality of life.^4,10

UCB is supporting broader awareness and understanding of the NPF consensus-based definition of on-treatment remission through our upcoming “You Missed a Spot” disease-state education campaign. The campaign encourages HCPs to view on-treatment remission as a meaningful, patient-relevant treatment target when evaluating therapeutic response, including measures related to skin clearance. Greater alignment around on-treatment remission may help inform clinical decision-making and facilitate more consistent comparison across studies, consistent with treat-to-target approaches that have been proposed in the management of inflammatory conditions.^11-13

Are we seeing a similar evolution in expectations in HS? And how does the approach Dr. Stark mentioned also apply in HS?

Donatello Crocetta: We’re seeing a similar shift in HS, where HCPs are increasingly aiming for earlier, more complete control of inflammation. Experts are working to define the “window of opportunity,” and what constitutes moderate disease and progression in routine practice.^14-15 This alignment will help provide clinicians with more practical guardrails for recognizing when disease is advancing earlier, before long-term damage accumulates, to optimize treatment decisions and long-term outcomes for those living with HS.^14-16 This approach reflects the ambition set out in our HS Vision Report to drive meaningful progress through earlier, more proactive, and holistic management.

For UCB, supporting people in accessing care early in their journey begins with raising awareness of HS, through education campaigns like MakeHStory, and creating spaces for the community, like the HS Summit, HS Patient Partnership Summit, to foster connections between those living with HS. UCB is also empowering HCPs to leverage diagnostic methods, like ultrasound, that can help support earlier detection and characterization of certain HS symptoms.¹⁷ Our ultrasound demonstration at AAD 2026 will highlight how HS severity can be misclassified when assessment relies on visible signs alone, and how palpation and ultrasound can reveal more advanced disease.

With the AAD Annual Meeting around the corner, what is one takeaway you are hoping to leave the meeting with?

Dr. Stark: For me, the key takeaway I am hoping to leave AAD with is a clearer sense of how we, as a community, can keep translating scientific progress into outcomes that genuinely make a difference to daily life. For people living with chronic inflammatory disease, progress shows up in everyday moments–the ability to plan ahead, feel more comfortable, and focus on life rather than symptoms–so I’m hoping that patient-focused mindset, and the ambition to keep raising expectations, is what stays front of mind for everyone. 


References: 

1. Shukla N, Paul M, Halley M, et al. Identifying barriers to care and research in hidradenitis suppurativa: findings from a patient engagement event. Br J Dermatol. 2020;182(6):1490-1492.
2. Vinkel C, et al. Hidradenitis Suppurativa: Causes, Features, and Current Treatments. J Clin Aesthet Dermatol. 2018;11(10):17-23 
3. Wu JJ, Penfold RB, Primatesta P, et al. The risk of depression, suicidal ideation and suicide attempt in patients with psoriasis, psoriatic arthritis or ankylosing spondylitis. J Eur Acad Dermatol Venereol. 2017;31(7):1168-1175. 
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7. Lee, Erika Yue, et al. “What is hidradenitis suppurativa?” Can Fam Physician vol. 63,2 (2017): 114-120.
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9. Armstrong AW, Gondo GC, Merola JF, et al. Remission Workgroup of the National Psoriasis Foundation. Defining On-Treatment Remission in Plaque Psoriasis: A Consensus Statement From the National Psoriasis Foundation. JAMA Dermatol. 2025 1;161(8):863-869. 
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11. van Vollenhoven RF, Bertsias G, Doria A, Isenberg D, Morand E, Petri MA, et al. 2021 DORIS definition of remission in SLE: final recommendations from an international task force. Lupus Sci Med. 2021;8(1):e000538. 
12. Peyrin-Biroulet L, Sandborn W, Sands BE, Reinisch W, Bemelman W, Bryant RV, et al. Selecting Therapeutic Targets in Inflammatory Bowel Disease (STRIDE): Determining Therapeutic Goals for Treat-to-Target. Am J Gastroenterol. 2015 Sep;110(9):1324-38. 
13. Hock, E.S., Martyn-St James, M., Wailoo, A. et al. Treat-to-Target Strategies in Rheumatoid Arthritis: a Systematic Review and Cost-Effectiveness Analysis. SN Compr. Clin. Med. 3, 838–854 (2021).
14. Martorell A, Jfri A, Ochando G, et al. Present and future trends of biologic therapies and small molecules in hidradenitis suppurativa. J IMIDs. 2022;2(1):8-19.
15. Marzano AV, Genovese G, Casazza G, et al. Evidence for a “window of opportunity” in hidradenitis suppurativa treated with adalimumab: a retrospective, real-life multicentre cohort study. Br J Dermatol. 2021;184(1):133-140.
16. Sayed CJ, Hsiao JL, Okun MM, Hidradenitis Suppurativa Foundation Women's Health Subcommittee. Clinical epidemiology and management of hidradenitis suppurativa. Obstet Gynecol. 2021;137(4):731-746.
17. Wortsman X, Jemec GBE. A 3D ultrasound study of sinus tract formation in hidradenitis suppurativa. Dermatol Online J. 2013;19(6).