Gaps in Care Among Uncontrolled Severe Asthma Patients in the United States.

BACKGROUND: Understanding the implementation of key guideline recommendations is critical for managing severe asthma (SA) in the treatment of uncontrolled disease. OBJECTIVE: To assess specialist visits and medication escalation in US patients with SA after events indicating uncontrolled disease (EUD) and associations with health outcomes and social disparity indicators. METHODS: Patients with SA appearing in administrative claims data spanning 2015 to 2020 were indexed hierarchically on asthma-related EUD, including hospitalizations, emergency department visits with systemic corticosteroid treatment, or outpatient visits with systemic corticosteroid treatment. Patients with SA without EUD served as controls. Eligibility included age 12 or greater, 12 months enrollment before and after index, no biologic use, and no other major respiratory disease during the pre-period. Escalation of care in the form of specialist visits and medication escalation, health care resource use, costs, and disease exacerbations were assessed during follow-up. RESULTS: We identified 180,736 patients with SA (90,368 uncontrolled and 90,368 controls). Between 35% and 51% of patients with SA with an EUD had no specialist visit or medication escalation. Follow-up exacerbations ranged from 51% to 4% across EUD cohorts, compared with 13% in controls. Among uncontrolled patients with SA who were Black or Hispanic/Latino, 41% and 38%, respectively, had no specialist visit or medication escalation after EUD, compared with 33% of non-Hispanic White patients. CONCLUSIONS: A substantial proportion of uncontrolled patients with SA had no evidence of specialist visits or medication escalation after uncontrolled disease, and there was a clear relationship between uncontrolled disease and subsequent health care resource use and exacerbations. Findings highlight the need for improved guideline-based care delivery to patients with SA, particularly for those facing social disparities.

Incremental cost burden among patients with severe uncontrolled asthma in the United States.

BACKGROUND: The economic burden of severe asthma and severe uncontrolled asthma (SUA) is significant. Updated assessments of health care resource utilization (HCRU) and cost are needed given the increase in treatment options and updates to guidelines in recent years. OBJECTIVE: To describe all-cause and asthma-related HCRU and costs among patients with SUA vs patients with nonsevere asthma in the United States using real-world data. METHODS: MarketScan administrative claims databases were used to select adults with persistent asthma for this retrospective analysis between January 1, 2013, and December 31, 2019. Asthma severity status was defined using the Global Initiative for Asthma step 4/5 criteria (index is the earliest date qualifying patients as severe or randomly assigned for nonsevere patients). Patients with SUA were a subset of the severe cohort meeting the following criteria: those who were hospitalized with asthma as the primary diagnosis or had at least 2 emergency department or outpatient visits with an asthma diagnosis and a steroid burst within 7 days. HCRU, costs (allcause and asthma-related defined as medical claims with an asthma diagnosis and pharmacy claims for asthma treatment), work loss, and indirect costs due to absenteeism and short-term disability (STD) were compared between patients with SUA, severe, and nonsevere asthma. Outcomes were reported during a fixed 12-month post-index period using chi-square and t-tests where appropriate. RESULTS: 533,172 patients with persistent asthma were identified (41.9% [223,610]) severe and 58.1% [309,562] nonsevere). Of the severe patients, 17.6% (39,380) had SUA. The mean (SD) all-cause total health care costs were significantly higher in patients with SUA ($23,353 [$40,817]) and severe asthma ($18,554 [$36,147]) compared with those with nonsevere asthma ($16,177 [$37,897], P < 0.001 vs nonsevere asthma). The results were consistent for asthma-related costs. In addition, although patients with severe asthma made up 41.9% of the total study population, they contributed disproportionately higher costs (60.5%) to the total asthma-related direct costs, with the effect more evident among patients with SUA (7.4% of study population contributed 17.7% of the total asthma-related costs). For the subset of patients with asthma with workplace absenteeism, patients with SUA lost more time from work (259.3 vs 236.2 hours lost, P = 0.002; 7.8 vs 5.3 STD days, P < 0.001), and had higher corresponding indirect costs ($5,944 vs $5,415, P = 0.002 for absenteeism related; $856 vs $582, P < 0.001 for STD related) compared with patients with nonsevere asthma. CONCLUSIONS: Patients with SUA have significantly higher asthma-related economic burden compared with patients with nonsevere asthma and contribute a disproportionally higher percentage of asthma-related costs. DISCLOSURES: This study was funded by Amgen and AstraZeneca. The design and analysis for this study was conducted primarily by Merative. Amgen and AstraZeneca provided funding to support protocol development, data analysis, and manuscript development activities associated with this study. Dr Burnette is on the advisory board and a consultant for GSK, a consultant and member of the advisory boards and speakers' bureaus of Sanofi, Genzyme, Regeneron, AstraZeneca, and Amgen Inc. Dr Wang, Dr Rane, Dr Lindsley, and Dr Llanos are employees and shareholders of Amgen Inc. Dr Chung and Dr Ambrose are employees and shareholders of AstraZeneca. Ms Princic and Ms Park are employees of Merative, which received funding from Amgen to conduct this study.

Racial and Ethnic Minorities at the Highest Risk of Uncontrolled Moderate-to-Severe Asthma: A United States Electronic Health Record Analysis.

Purpose: The identification of risk factors associated with uncontrolled moderate-to-severe asthma is important to improve asthma outcomes. Aim of this study was to identify risk factors for uncontrolled asthma in United States cohort using electronic health record (EHR)-derived data. Patients and Methods: In this retrospective real-world study, de-identified data of adolescent and adult patients (≥12 years old) with moderate-to-severe asthma, based on asthma medications within 12 months prior to asthma-related visit (index date), were extracted from the Optum® Humedica EHR. The baseline period was 12 months prior to the index date. Uncontrolled asthma was defined as ≥2 outpatient oral corticosteroid bursts for asthma or ≥2 emergency department visits or ≥1 inpatient visit for asthma. A Cox proportional hazard model was applied. Results: There were 402,403 patients in the EHR between January 1, 2012, and December 31, 2018, who met the inclusion criteria and were analyzed. African American (AA) race (hazard ratio [HR]: 2.08), Medicaid insurance (HR: 1.71), Hispanic ethnicity (HR: 1.34), age of 12 to <18 years (HR 1.20), body mass index of ≥35 kg/m2 (HR: 1.20), and female sex (HR 1.19) were identified as risk factors associated with uncontrolled asthma (P < 0.001). Comorbidities characterized by type 2 inflammation, including a blood eosinophil count of ≥300 cells/µL (as compared with eosinophil <150 cells/µL; HR: 1.40, P < 0.001) and food allergy (HR: 1.31), were associated with a significantly higher risk of uncontrolled asthma; pneumonia was also a comorbidity associated with an increased risk (HR: 1.35) of uncontrolled asthma. Conversely, allergic rhinitis (HR: 0.84) was associated with a significantly lower risk of uncontrolled asthma. Conclusion: This large study demonstrates multiple risk factors for uncontrolled asthma. Of note, AA and Hispanic individuals with Medicaid insurance are at a significantly higher risk of uncontrolled asthma versus their White, non-Hispanic counterparts with commercial insurance.

Oral corticosteroid-sparing effects of mepolizumab in severe eosinophilic asthma: evidence from randomized controlled trials and real-world studies.

Oral corticosteroids (OCS) have long been a mainstay of treatment for asthma exacerbations and chronic severe asthma. However, it is increasingly recognized that both long-term and short-term OCS use are directly associated with a wide range of serious adverse effects, and as such OCS-sparing treatment alternatives are now widely recommended for patients with severe asthma. While several international guidelines recommend these treatments, guidance on OCS tapering, and which patients are most likely to tolerate OCS reduction and/or discontinuation, is still lacking. Several biologics have demonstrated efficacy in patients with OCS-dependent asthma. One OCS-sparing treatment is the anti-interleukin-5 monoclonal antibody mepolizumab, which is approved for the treatment of severe eosinophilic asthma. In addition to improved exacerbation rates, asthma control, quality of life, and lung function among patients with severe eosinophilic asthma, mepolizumab also has an OCS-sparing effect, which has been demonstrated in randomized controlled trials and real-world studies. Both physicians and patients express concerns about the adverse effects of OCS, and additional data from the randomized, controlled SIRIUS trial (NCT01691508) highlight the high level of concern among patients regarding OCS-related burden. In this article, we discuss current guidance on OCS-sparing strategies for patients with severe asthma, provide a summary of the available evidence of the OCS-sparing effect of mepolizumab, and highlight patient and physician perspectives on the use of OCS and OCS-sparing treatments in severe asthma.

Physical deconditioning as a cause of breathlessness among obese adolescents with a diagnosis of asthma.

BACKGROUND: Obese children frequently complain of breathlessness. Asthma and obesity can both contribute to the symptoms during exercise, and this symptom can contribute to a diagnosis of asthma in these children. Despite the high prevalence of obesity few studies have investigated the cardiopulmonary physiology of breathlessness in obese children with a diagnosis of asthma. METHODS: In this case-control study, thirty adolescents between age 12 and 19 were studied with baseline spirometry and a cardiopulmonary exercise test. Ten adolescents were normal controls, ten had obesity without a diagnosis of asthma, and ten had obesity with a history of physician-diagnosed asthma. RESULTS: Baseline characteristics including complete blood count and spirometry were comparable between obese adolescents with and without a diagnosis of asthma. During exercise, obese asthmatic and obese non-asthmatic adolescents had significantly reduced physical fitness compared to healthy controls as evidenced by decreased peak oxygen uptake after adjusting for actual body weight (21.7 ± 4.5 vs. 21.4 ± 5.4 vs. 35.3 ± 5.8 ml/kg/min, respectively). However, pulmonary capacity at the peak of exercise was comparable among all three groups as evidenced by similar pulmonary reserve. CONCLUSION: In this study, breathlessness was primarily due to cardiopulmonary deconditioning in the majority of obese adolescents with or without a diagnosis of asthma.

Desensitization of an adult patient with Pompe disease and a history of anaphylaxis to alglucosidase alfa.

We report on the successful desensitization of an adult female with Pompe disease who had previously experienced anaphylaxis to intravenous alglucosidase alfa therapy. The starting alglucosidase alfa dose for desensitization was 10mg/kg with gradual dose escalation and desensitization via serial dilution was completed over five infusions. This methodology serves as a means to desensitize patients with prior anaphylactic response to alglucosidase alfa so that enzyme replacement therapy can be utilized.