Omalizumab’s use is restricted to patients with severe asthma and evidence of allergic sensitization, and the dose administered is adjusted for total IgE level and body weight. Administered by subcutaneous injection every 2–4 weeks to asthmatic patients, it lowers free plasma IgE to undetectable levels and significantly reduces the magnitude of both early and late bronchospastic responses to antigen challenge. Omalizumab’s most important clinical effect is reduction in the frequency and severity of asthma exacerbations, while enabling a reduction in corticosteroid requirements. Combined analysis of several clinical trials has shown that the patients most likely to respond are those with a history of repeated exacerbations, a high requirement for corticosteroid treatment, and poor pulmonary function. Similarly, the exacerbations most often prevented are the most severe; omalizumab treatment reduced exacerbations requiring hospitalization by 88%. Because exacerbations drive so much of the direct and indirect costs of asthma, these benefits can justify omalizumab’s high cost.
The addition of omalizumab to standard, guideline-based therapy for asthmatic inner-city children and adolescents in early summer significantly improved overall asthma control, reduced the need for other medications, and nearly eliminated the autumnal peak in exacerbations. Omalizumab has also been proven effective as a treatment for chronic recurrent urticaria (for which the drug is now approved) and for peanut allergy.
T2 cells secrete IL-5 as a pro-eosinophilic cytokine that results in eosinophilic airway inflammation. Although not central to the mechanisms of asthma in all patients, a substantial proportion of patients with severe asthma have airway and peripheral eosinophilia driven by up-regulation of IL-5-secreting T2 lymphocytes. Two humanized monoclonal antibodies targeting IL-5, mepolizumab and reslizumab, and another targeting the IL-5 receptor, benralizumab, have recently been developed for the treatment of eosinophilic asthma. Clinical trials with these drugs have shown them to be effective in preventing exacerbations in asthmatic patients with peripheral eosinophilia, leading to their approval as add-on, maintenance therapy of severe asthma in patients with an eosinophilic phenotype.
Like omalizumab, reslizumab carries a small (0.3%) risk of anaphylaxis, and a period of observation following infusion is recommended. Mepolizumab, although not associated with anaphylaxis, has resulted in reports of hypersensitivity. In addition, reactivation of herpes zoster has been reported in some patients who received mepolizumab.
Clinical trials of dupilumab (an antibody directed against the IL-4α co-receptor for both IL-4 and IL-13; not yet approved) have shown it to reduce exacerbation frequency and improve measures of asthma control in patients with and without systemic eosinophilia and, further, to markedly reduce the severity of allergic dermatitis.