[The treatment of severe psoriatic arthritis with methotrexate in a weekly "mini-pulse" dosage plan].

The paper reports on the authors' own experience on the effect of therapy with methotrexate (MTX) in 18 patients with invalidant psoriatic arthritis (PA). The therapeutic scheme was of the weekly "mini-pulse" type (three doses of 2.5 mg administered at 12-hour interval, with a gradual increase to 15 mg/week). The results were very good in 12 cases (66.6%), good in 3 cases (16.6%) and absent in other two cases (11.1%). These results and the data in the literature lead to the conclusion that MTX is a valuable therapeutic alternative for severe P.A. under the conditions of a correct surveillance with the observance of the contraindications.