Subcutaneously administered methylnaltrexone (MNTX) (Relistor), a peripherally acting mu-opioid receptor antagonist, relieves opioid-induced constipation (OID) in both chronic, noncancer-related illness and cancer-related illness, a new analysis concludes.

“While these are two very different patient groups, the ability to have something to treat OIC in noncancer patients who stay on opioids for whatever reason helps, because [otherwise] these patients are not doing well,” said lead author Eric Shah, MD, motility director for the Dartmouth program at Dartmouth Hitchcock Health, Lebanon, N.H.

Importantly, peripherally acting mu-opioid receptor antagonists such as MNTX do not affect overall pain control to any significant extent, which is “reassuring,” he said in an interview.

These drugs decrease the constipating effects of opioids without reversing CNS-mediated opioid effects, he explained.

“Methylnaltrexone has already been approved for the treatment of OIC in adults with chronic noncancer pain as well as for OIC in adults with advanced illness who are receiving palliative care, which is often the case in patients with cancer-related pain,” he noted.

Dr. Shah discussed the new analysis during PAINWeek 2020, the American Society of Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine 19th Annual Pain Medicine Meeting.

The analysis was based on a review of data collected in two previously reported randomized, placebo-controlled studies (study 302 and 4000), which were used to gain approval.

The new analysis shows that “the drug works up front, and the effect is able to be maintained. I think the studies are clinically relevant in that patients are able to have a bowel movement quickly after you give them an injectable formulation when they are vomiting or otherwise can’t tolerate a pill and they are feeling miserable,” Dr. Shah commented. Many patients with OIC are constipated for reasons other than from opioid use. They often have other side effects from opioids, including bloating, nausea, and vomiting.

“When patients go to the emergency room, it’s not just that they are not able to have a bowel movement; they are often also vomiting, so it’s important to have agents that can be given in a manner that avoids the need for oral medication,” Dr. Shah said. MNTX is the only peripherally acting opioid antagonist available in a subcutaneous formulation.

Moreover, if patients are able to control these symptoms at home with an injectable formulation, they may not need to go to the ED for treatment of their gastrointestinal distress, he added.
 

Viable product

In a comment, Darren Brenner, MD, associate professor of medicine and surgery, Northwestern University, Chicago, who has worked with this subcutaneous formulation, said it is “definitely a viable product.

“The data presented here were in patients with advanced illness receiving palliative care when other laxatives have failed, and the difference and the potential benefit for MNTX is that it is the only peripherally acting mu-opioid receptor antagonist that is approved for advanced cancer,” he added. The other products that are currently approved, naloxegol (Movantik) and naldemedine (Symproic), are both indicated for chronic, noncancer pain.

The other potential benefit of subcutaneous MNTX is that it can work very rapidly for the patients who respond to it. “One of the things investigators did not mention in these two trials but which has been shown in previous studies is that almost half of patients who respond to this drug respond within the first 30 minutes of receiving the injection,” Dr. Brenner said in an interview.

This can be very beneficial in an emergency setting, because it may avoid having patients admitted to hospital. They can be discharged and sent home with enough drug to use on demand, Dr. Brenner suggested.
 

New analysis of data from studies 302 and 4000

Both studies were carried out in adults with advanced illness and OIC whose conditions were refractory to laxative use. Both of the studies were placebo controlled.

Study 302 involved 78 patients with cancer and 56 patients with noncancer-related OIC. MNTX was given at a dose of 0.15 mg/kg subcutaneously every other day for 2 weeks.

Study 4000 included 152 patients with cancer and OIC and 78 patients with noncancer-related OIC. In this study, the dose of MNTX was based on body weight. Seven or fewer doses of either 8 mg or 12 mg were given subcutaneously for 2 weeks.

The main endpoints of both studies was the proportion of patients who achieved a rescue-free laxation (RFL) response within 4 hours after the first dose and the proportion of patients with an RFL response within 4 hours for two or more of the first four doses within 24 hours.

Dr. Shah explained that RFL is a meaningful clinical endpoint. Patients could achieve a bowel movement with the two prespecified time endpoints in both studies.

Not all patients were hospitalized for OIC, Dr. Shah noted. Entry criteria were strict and included having fewer than three bowel movements during the previous week and no clinically significant laxation (defecation) within 48 hours of receiving the first dose of study drug.

“In both studies, a significantly greater proportion of patients treated with MNTX versus placebo achieved an RFL within 4 hours after the first dose among both cancer and noncancer patients,” the investigators reported.

This article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Subcutaneously administered methylnaltrexone (MNTX) (Relistor), a peripherally acting mu-opioid receptor antagonist, relieves opioid-induced constipation (OID) in both chronic, noncancer-related illness and cancer-related illness, a new analysis concludes.

“While these are two very different patient groups, the ability to have something to treat OIC in noncancer patients who stay on opioids for whatever reason helps, because [otherwise] these patients are not doing well,” said lead author Eric Shah, MD, motility director for the Dartmouth program at Dartmouth Hitchcock Health, Lebanon, N.H.

Importantly, peripherally acting mu-opioid receptor antagonists such as MNTX do not affect overall pain control to any significant extent, which is “reassuring,” he said in an interview.

These drugs decrease the constipating effects of opioids without reversing CNS-mediated opioid effects, he explained.

“Methylnaltrexone has already been approved for the treatment of OIC in adults with chronic noncancer pain as well as for OIC in adults with advanced illness who are receiving palliative care, which is often the case in patients with cancer-related pain,” he noted.

Dr. Shah discussed the new analysis during PAINWeek 2020, the American Society of Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine 19th Annual Pain Medicine Meeting.

The analysis was based on a review of data collected in two previously reported randomized, placebo-controlled studies (study 302 and 4000), which were used to gain approval.

The new analysis shows that “the drug works up front, and the effect is able to be maintained. I think the studies are clinically relevant in that patients are able to have a bowel movement quickly after you give them an injectable formulation when they are vomiting or otherwise can’t tolerate a pill and they are feeling miserable,” Dr. Shah commented. Many patients with OIC are constipated for reasons other than from opioid use. They often have other side effects from opioids, including bloating, nausea, and vomiting.

“When patients go to the emergency room, it’s not just that they are not able to have a bowel movement; they are often also vomiting, so it’s important to have agents that can be given in a manner that avoids the need for oral medication,” Dr. Shah said. MNTX is the only peripherally acting opioid antagonist available in a subcutaneous formulation.

Moreover, if patients are able to control these symptoms at home with an injectable formulation, they may not need to go to the ED for treatment of their gastrointestinal distress, he added.
 

Viable product

In a comment, Darren Brenner, MD, associate professor of medicine and surgery, Northwestern University, Chicago, who has worked with this subcutaneous formulation, said it is “definitely a viable product.

“The data presented here were in patients with advanced illness receiving palliative care when other laxatives have failed, and the difference and the potential benefit for MNTX is that it is the only peripherally acting mu-opioid receptor antagonist that is approved for advanced cancer,” he added. The other products that are currently approved, naloxegol (Movantik) and naldemedine (Symproic), are both indicated for chronic, noncancer pain.

The other potential benefit of subcutaneous MNTX is that it can work very rapidly for the patients who respond to it. “One of the things investigators did not mention in these two trials but which has been shown in previous studies is that almost half of patients who respond to this drug respond within the first 30 minutes of receiving the injection,” Dr. Brenner said in an interview.

This can be very beneficial in an emergency setting, because it may avoid having patients admitted to hospital. They can be discharged and sent home with enough drug to use on demand, Dr. Brenner suggested.
 

New analysis of data from studies 302 and 4000

Both studies were carried out in adults with advanced illness and OIC whose conditions were refractory to laxative use. Both of the studies were placebo controlled.

Study 302 involved 78 patients with cancer and 56 patients with noncancer-related OIC. MNTX was given at a dose of 0.15 mg/kg subcutaneously every other day for 2 weeks.

Study 4000 included 152 patients with cancer and OIC and 78 patients with noncancer-related OIC. In this study, the dose of MNTX was based on body weight. Seven or fewer doses of either 8 mg or 12 mg were given subcutaneously for 2 weeks.

The main endpoints of both studies was the proportion of patients who achieved a rescue-free laxation (RFL) response within 4 hours after the first dose and the proportion of patients with an RFL response within 4 hours for two or more of the first four doses within 24 hours.

Dr. Shah explained that RFL is a meaningful clinical endpoint. Patients could achieve a bowel movement with the two prespecified time endpoints in both studies.

Not all patients were hospitalized for OIC, Dr. Shah noted. Entry criteria were strict and included having fewer than three bowel movements during the previous week and no clinically significant laxation (defecation) within 48 hours of receiving the first dose of study drug.

“In both studies, a significantly greater proportion of patients treated with MNTX versus placebo achieved an RFL within 4 hours after the first dose among both cancer and noncancer patients,” the investigators reported.

This article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Subcutaneously administered methylnaltrexone (MNTX) (Relistor), a peripherally acting mu-opioid receptor antagonist, relieves opioid-induced constipation (OID) in both chronic, noncancer-related illness and cancer-related illness, a new analysis concludes.

“While these are two very different patient groups, the ability to have something to treat OIC in noncancer patients who stay on opioids for whatever reason helps, because [otherwise] these patients are not doing well,” said lead author Eric Shah, MD, motility director for the Dartmouth program at Dartmouth Hitchcock Health, Lebanon, N.H.

Importantly, peripherally acting mu-opioid receptor antagonists such as MNTX do not affect overall pain control to any significant extent, which is “reassuring,” he said in an interview.

These drugs decrease the constipating effects of opioids without reversing CNS-mediated opioid effects, he explained.

“Methylnaltrexone has already been approved for the treatment of OIC in adults with chronic noncancer pain as well as for OIC in adults with advanced illness who are receiving palliative care, which is often the case in patients with cancer-related pain,” he noted.

Dr. Shah discussed the new analysis during PAINWeek 2020, the American Society of Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine 19th Annual Pain Medicine Meeting.

The analysis was based on a review of data collected in two previously reported randomized, placebo-controlled studies (study 302 and 4000), which were used to gain approval.

The new analysis shows that “the drug works up front, and the effect is able to be maintained. I think the studies are clinically relevant in that patients are able to have a bowel movement quickly after you give them an injectable formulation when they are vomiting or otherwise can’t tolerate a pill and they are feeling miserable,” Dr. Shah commented. Many patients with OIC are constipated for reasons other than from opioid use. They often have other side effects from opioids, including bloating, nausea, and vomiting.

“When patients go to the emergency room, it’s not just that they are not able to have a bowel movement; they are often also vomiting, so it’s important to have agents that can be given in a manner that avoids the need for oral medication,” Dr. Shah said. MNTX is the only peripherally acting opioid antagonist available in a subcutaneous formulation.

Moreover, if patients are able to control these symptoms at home with an injectable formulation, they may not need to go to the ED for treatment of their gastrointestinal distress, he added.
 

Viable product

In a comment, Darren Brenner, MD, associate professor of medicine and surgery, Northwestern University, Chicago, who has worked with this subcutaneous formulation, said it is “definitely a viable product.

“The data presented here were in patients with advanced illness receiving palliative care when other laxatives have failed, and the difference and the potential benefit for MNTX is that it is the only peripherally acting mu-opioid receptor antagonist that is approved for advanced cancer,” he added. The other products that are currently approved, naloxegol (Movantik) and naldemedine (Symproic), are both indicated for chronic, noncancer pain.

The other potential benefit of subcutaneous MNTX is that it can work very rapidly for the patients who respond to it. “One of the things investigators did not mention in these two trials but which has been shown in previous studies is that almost half of patients who respond to this drug respond within the first 30 minutes of receiving the injection,” Dr. Brenner said in an interview.

This can be very beneficial in an emergency setting, because it may avoid having patients admitted to hospital. They can be discharged and sent home with enough drug to use on demand, Dr. Brenner suggested.
 

New analysis of data from studies 302 and 4000

Both studies were carried out in adults with advanced illness and OIC whose conditions were refractory to laxative use. Both of the studies were placebo controlled.

Study 302 involved 78 patients with cancer and 56 patients with noncancer-related OIC. MNTX was given at a dose of 0.15 mg/kg subcutaneously every other day for 2 weeks.

Study 4000 included 152 patients with cancer and OIC and 78 patients with noncancer-related OIC. In this study, the dose of MNTX was based on body weight. Seven or fewer doses of either 8 mg or 12 mg were given subcutaneously for 2 weeks.

The main endpoints of both studies was the proportion of patients who achieved a rescue-free laxation (RFL) response within 4 hours after the first dose and the proportion of patients with an RFL response within 4 hours for two or more of the first four doses within 24 hours.

Dr. Shah explained that RFL is a meaningful clinical endpoint. Patients could achieve a bowel movement with the two prespecified time endpoints in both studies.

Not all patients were hospitalized for OIC, Dr. Shah noted. Entry criteria were strict and included having fewer than three bowel movements during the previous week and no clinically significant laxation (defecation) within 48 hours of receiving the first dose of study drug.

“In both studies, a significantly greater proportion of patients treated with MNTX versus placebo achieved an RFL within 4 hours after the first dose among both cancer and noncancer patients,” the investigators reported.

This article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act was associated with a significant reduction in breast, colon, and lung cancer mortality, likely because of earlier stage of cancer diagnosis, according to a review published in JAMA Network Open.

Researchers reviewed data on 523,802 patients in the National Cancer Database who were diagnosed with cancer from 2012 through 2015. Slightly more than half of patients (55.2%) lived in Medicaid expansion states.

After expansion, mortality significantly decreased in expansion states (hazard ratio, 0.98; P  = .008) but not in nonexpansion states (HR, 1.01; P  = .43). The difference was significant in a difference-in-difference analysis (HR, 1.03; P = .01).

Across 69,000 patients with newly diagnosed cancer in Medicaid expansion states, the 2% decrease in the hazard of death would translate to 1,384 lives saved annually.

The benefit was primarily observed in patients with nonmetastatic cancer. For patients with stage I-III cancer, the risk of death was increased in nonexpansion states (HR, 1.05; P < .001) and unchanged in expansion states (HR, 0.99; P = .64). Mortality significantly improved in expansion states vs. nonexpansion states (HR, 1.05; P = .003).

For patients with stage IV cancer, both expansion and nonexpansion states had improvements in mortality, but the differences were not significant.

“Earlier stage at diagnosis appears to explain the mortality improvement,” wrote study author Miranda Lam, MD, of Harvard Medical School, Boston, and colleagues.
 

Clinical benefits, ‘no economic downside’

Under the Affordable Care Act, passed in 2010, states have the option of expanding Medicaid eligibility to adults with incomes at or below 138% of the federal poverty level. As of March 2020, 36 states and the District of Columbia had expanded Medicaid, with more than 20 million residents obtaining coverage.

Previous studies have associated Medicaid expansion with fewer patients being uninsured, increased cancer screening, and earlier stage of diagnosis, as well as reduced racial disparities in access to high-volume hospitals for cancer surgery and increased rates of cancer surgery among low-income patients.

“This study adds to an increasingly large body of research finding that Medicaid expansion has improved our ability to fight cancer,” said Coleman Drake, PhD, of the University of Pittsburgh, who was not involved in this study.

“Obtaining health insurance through Medicaid allows patients to receive recommended preventive cancer screenings, which explains the increase in early-stage diagnosis rates. Detecting cancer early is critical for successful cancer treatment,” Dr. Drake noted.

“It is hard to overstate the positive effects of Medicaid expansion on health outcomes. At the same time, concerns that Medicaid expansion would be costly to state governments’ budgets have not been realized. In short, Medicaid expansion yields many benefits and has no economic downside for state policymakers. Clinical and economic evidence make an overwhelming case for states to expand Medicaid,” Dr. Drake said.
 

Significant difference for lung cancer

Most patients in this study were women (73.6%), and the patients’ mean age was 54.8 years (range, 40-64 years). Patients had newly diagnosed breast cancer (52.2%), colorectal cancer (21.3%), and lung cancer (26.5%).

The benefits of Medicaid expansion persisted after adjustment for education, income, insurance, and race.

The lower mortality in expansion states compared with nonexpansion states was similar across all three cancer types. However, in stratified analyses, the difference was significant only for lung cancer (P = .03).

“Lung cancer has a higher mortality rate than breast and colorectal cancer, and with longer follow-up, it is possible that the lower mortality rates seen for breast and colorectal cancer may also become significant,” the authors wrote.

This research was funded by Harvard Catalyst, the Harvard Clinical and Translational Science Center, and the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences at the National Institutes of Health. The investigators and Dr. Drake had no relevant disclosures.

[email protected]

SOURCE: Lam MB et al. JAMA Netw Open. 2020 Nov 2;3(11):e2024366.

Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act was associated with a significant reduction in breast, colon, and lung cancer mortality, likely because of earlier stage of cancer diagnosis, according to a review published in JAMA Network Open.

Researchers reviewed data on 523,802 patients in the National Cancer Database who were diagnosed with cancer from 2012 through 2015. Slightly more than half of patients (55.2%) lived in Medicaid expansion states.

After expansion, mortality significantly decreased in expansion states (hazard ratio, 0.98; P  = .008) but not in nonexpansion states (HR, 1.01; P  = .43). The difference was significant in a difference-in-difference analysis (HR, 1.03; P = .01).

Across 69,000 patients with newly diagnosed cancer in Medicaid expansion states, the 2% decrease in the hazard of death would translate to 1,384 lives saved annually.

The benefit was primarily observed in patients with nonmetastatic cancer. For patients with stage I-III cancer, the risk of death was increased in nonexpansion states (HR, 1.05; P < .001) and unchanged in expansion states (HR, 0.99; P = .64). Mortality significantly improved in expansion states vs. nonexpansion states (HR, 1.05; P = .003).

For patients with stage IV cancer, both expansion and nonexpansion states had improvements in mortality, but the differences were not significant.

“Earlier stage at diagnosis appears to explain the mortality improvement,” wrote study author Miranda Lam, MD, of Harvard Medical School, Boston, and colleagues.
 

Clinical benefits, ‘no economic downside’

Under the Affordable Care Act, passed in 2010, states have the option of expanding Medicaid eligibility to adults with incomes at or below 138% of the federal poverty level. As of March 2020, 36 states and the District of Columbia had expanded Medicaid, with more than 20 million residents obtaining coverage.

Previous studies have associated Medicaid expansion with fewer patients being uninsured, increased cancer screening, and earlier stage of diagnosis, as well as reduced racial disparities in access to high-volume hospitals for cancer surgery and increased rates of cancer surgery among low-income patients.

“This study adds to an increasingly large body of research finding that Medicaid expansion has improved our ability to fight cancer,” said Coleman Drake, PhD, of the University of Pittsburgh, who was not involved in this study.

“Obtaining health insurance through Medicaid allows patients to receive recommended preventive cancer screenings, which explains the increase in early-stage diagnosis rates. Detecting cancer early is critical for successful cancer treatment,” Dr. Drake noted.

“It is hard to overstate the positive effects of Medicaid expansion on health outcomes. At the same time, concerns that Medicaid expansion would be costly to state governments’ budgets have not been realized. In short, Medicaid expansion yields many benefits and has no economic downside for state policymakers. Clinical and economic evidence make an overwhelming case for states to expand Medicaid,” Dr. Drake said.
 

Significant difference for lung cancer

Most patients in this study were women (73.6%), and the patients’ mean age was 54.8 years (range, 40-64 years). Patients had newly diagnosed breast cancer (52.2%), colorectal cancer (21.3%), and lung cancer (26.5%).

The benefits of Medicaid expansion persisted after adjustment for education, income, insurance, and race.

The lower mortality in expansion states compared with nonexpansion states was similar across all three cancer types. However, in stratified analyses, the difference was significant only for lung cancer (P = .03).

“Lung cancer has a higher mortality rate than breast and colorectal cancer, and with longer follow-up, it is possible that the lower mortality rates seen for breast and colorectal cancer may also become significant,” the authors wrote.

This research was funded by Harvard Catalyst, the Harvard Clinical and Translational Science Center, and the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences at the National Institutes of Health. The investigators and Dr. Drake had no relevant disclosures.

[email protected]

SOURCE: Lam MB et al. JAMA Netw Open. 2020 Nov 2;3(11):e2024366.

Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act was associated with a significant reduction in breast, colon, and lung cancer mortality, likely because of earlier stage of cancer diagnosis, according to a review published in JAMA Network Open.

Researchers reviewed data on 523,802 patients in the National Cancer Database who were diagnosed with cancer from 2012 through 2015. Slightly more than half of patients (55.2%) lived in Medicaid expansion states.

After expansion, mortality significantly decreased in expansion states (hazard ratio, 0.98; P  = .008) but not in nonexpansion states (HR, 1.01; P  = .43). The difference was significant in a difference-in-difference analysis (HR, 1.03; P = .01).

Across 69,000 patients with newly diagnosed cancer in Medicaid expansion states, the 2% decrease in the hazard of death would translate to 1,384 lives saved annually.

The benefit was primarily observed in patients with nonmetastatic cancer. For patients with stage I-III cancer, the risk of death was increased in nonexpansion states (HR, 1.05; P < .001) and unchanged in expansion states (HR, 0.99; P = .64). Mortality significantly improved in expansion states vs. nonexpansion states (HR, 1.05; P = .003).

For patients with stage IV cancer, both expansion and nonexpansion states had improvements in mortality, but the differences were not significant.

“Earlier stage at diagnosis appears to explain the mortality improvement,” wrote study author Miranda Lam, MD, of Harvard Medical School, Boston, and colleagues.
 

Clinical benefits, ‘no economic downside’

Under the Affordable Care Act, passed in 2010, states have the option of expanding Medicaid eligibility to adults with incomes at or below 138% of the federal poverty level. As of March 2020, 36 states and the District of Columbia had expanded Medicaid, with more than 20 million residents obtaining coverage.

Previous studies have associated Medicaid expansion with fewer patients being uninsured, increased cancer screening, and earlier stage of diagnosis, as well as reduced racial disparities in access to high-volume hospitals for cancer surgery and increased rates of cancer surgery among low-income patients.

“This study adds to an increasingly large body of research finding that Medicaid expansion has improved our ability to fight cancer,” said Coleman Drake, PhD, of the University of Pittsburgh, who was not involved in this study.

“Obtaining health insurance through Medicaid allows patients to receive recommended preventive cancer screenings, which explains the increase in early-stage diagnosis rates. Detecting cancer early is critical for successful cancer treatment,” Dr. Drake noted.

“It is hard to overstate the positive effects of Medicaid expansion on health outcomes. At the same time, concerns that Medicaid expansion would be costly to state governments’ budgets have not been realized. In short, Medicaid expansion yields many benefits and has no economic downside for state policymakers. Clinical and economic evidence make an overwhelming case for states to expand Medicaid,” Dr. Drake said.
 

Significant difference for lung cancer

Most patients in this study were women (73.6%), and the patients’ mean age was 54.8 years (range, 40-64 years). Patients had newly diagnosed breast cancer (52.2%), colorectal cancer (21.3%), and lung cancer (26.5%).

The benefits of Medicaid expansion persisted after adjustment for education, income, insurance, and race.

The lower mortality in expansion states compared with nonexpansion states was similar across all three cancer types. However, in stratified analyses, the difference was significant only for lung cancer (P = .03).

“Lung cancer has a higher mortality rate than breast and colorectal cancer, and with longer follow-up, it is possible that the lower mortality rates seen for breast and colorectal cancer may also become significant,” the authors wrote.

This research was funded by Harvard Catalyst, the Harvard Clinical and Translational Science Center, and the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences at the National Institutes of Health. The investigators and Dr. Drake had no relevant disclosures.

[email protected]

SOURCE: Lam MB et al. JAMA Netw Open. 2020 Nov 2;3(11):e2024366.

Patients self-identified as non-White are far more likely to express a preference for dermatologic care from a physician of their own race or ethnicity, according to a patient survey.

In the survey, 42% of self-identified Black patients and 44% of self-identified Hispanic patients assigned some level of importance to the race or ethnicity of their dermatologist. Of patients self-identified as White, the figure was 2%, which was significantly lower (P less than .001).

Responses to the survey indicated that there is concern among non-White patients that White physicians are not fully sensitive to the clinical issues presented by their skin type. For example, 22% of Hispanic patients and 21% of Black patients agreed that a race-concordant physician would be better trained to treat their skin.

The results of the survey were recently published in a Research Letter in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology.

When patients were asked to agree or disagree with the statement that non-White patients receive the same quality of care as White patients, about a third disagreed, “but about half said they were unsure, which I interpret basically as a negative answer,” reported the lead author, Adam Friedman, MD, professor and interim chair of the department of dermatology at George Washington University, Washington.

“These data are a call to action. Certainly, we need to diversify our workforce to mirror the overall population, but we can also do more to improve training for dermatologic diseases across skin types,” Dr. Friedman said in an interview.

“Ensuring all skin types are represented in all dermatologic education, from resident book clubs to the national stage is but one step to making dermatology more inclusive and prepared to care for all patients,” he added.

Ninety-two patients receiving dermatology care at Dr. Friedman’s institution completed the survey. Fifty identified themselves as White, nine as Hispanic, and 33 as Black. Allowing patients to self-identify race was an important feature of this survey, according to Dr. Friedman.

“Something I really struggle with is terminology. Are race and ethnicity the appropriate terms when discussing different skin types and tones? It is so easy to misuse even validated tools. The Fitzpatrick Scale, for example, requires patients to relay how easily they burn, but reveals nothing about how patients refer to their skin tone,” Dr. Friedman explained. “We need to reset how we characterize and categorize skin types.”

Among those who assigned at least some importance to having a dermatologist of the same race or ethnicity, the most common reason was that such physicians “are better able to listen and relate to me.” Thirty percent of Black patients and 22% of Hispanic patients agreed with this statement. The perception that such physicians are better trained to treat non-White skin was the next most common reason.

The results of the survey emphasize the importance of ensuring that there is comprehensive training in managing all skin types and that physicians receive rigorous implicit bias and cultural sensitivity training in order to win patient trust, according to Dr. Friedman. He suggested that the perception that White physicians might not provide optimal care to non-White patients by study participants “has some validity. Structural racism in medicine is well-documented, and dermatologists have already begun to combat this on several fronts.”

In fact, the process of conducting and analyzing data from this survey proved to be its own lesson in sociocultural sensitivity, he said.

After a draft completed peer review and was accepted for publication, Dr. Friedman was confronted with numerous criticisms of the language that was used. In particular, one of his former residents, Misty Eleryan, MD, who is now a Mohs Fellow at the University of California, Los Angeles, was instrumental in pointing out problems. Ultimately, he withdrew the paper to rephrase the findings.

“It was not until then that I also learned that there is a JAAD Sensitivity Workgroup, which was very helpful in identifying issues we had overlooked,” Dr. Friedman said. For example, he had used the term “minorities” for non-White populations, which is not only inaccurate in many situations but has a pejorative undertone.

“It is important to recognize that the impact is more important than the intention,” said Dr. Friedman, who reported that he learned a lot in this process.

It is the need for this type of augmented sensitivity that the survey underscores, he added. He called for cultural sensitivity to be part of medical training to undo unrecognized bias, and said, “We need to understand how our patients perceive us.”

SOURCE: Friedman A et al. J Am Acad Dermatol. 2020 Sep 16;S0190-9622(20)32620-7. doi: 10.1016/j.jaad.2020.09.032.

Patients self-identified as non-White are far more likely to express a preference for dermatologic care from a physician of their own race or ethnicity, according to a patient survey.

In the survey, 42% of self-identified Black patients and 44% of self-identified Hispanic patients assigned some level of importance to the race or ethnicity of their dermatologist. Of patients self-identified as White, the figure was 2%, which was significantly lower (P less than .001).

Responses to the survey indicated that there is concern among non-White patients that White physicians are not fully sensitive to the clinical issues presented by their skin type. For example, 22% of Hispanic patients and 21% of Black patients agreed that a race-concordant physician would be better trained to treat their skin.

The results of the survey were recently published in a Research Letter in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology.

When patients were asked to agree or disagree with the statement that non-White patients receive the same quality of care as White patients, about a third disagreed, “but about half said they were unsure, which I interpret basically as a negative answer,” reported the lead author, Adam Friedman, MD, professor and interim chair of the department of dermatology at George Washington University, Washington.

“These data are a call to action. Certainly, we need to diversify our workforce to mirror the overall population, but we can also do more to improve training for dermatologic diseases across skin types,” Dr. Friedman said in an interview.

“Ensuring all skin types are represented in all dermatologic education, from resident book clubs to the national stage is but one step to making dermatology more inclusive and prepared to care for all patients,” he added.

Ninety-two patients receiving dermatology care at Dr. Friedman’s institution completed the survey. Fifty identified themselves as White, nine as Hispanic, and 33 as Black. Allowing patients to self-identify race was an important feature of this survey, according to Dr. Friedman.

“Something I really struggle with is terminology. Are race and ethnicity the appropriate terms when discussing different skin types and tones? It is so easy to misuse even validated tools. The Fitzpatrick Scale, for example, requires patients to relay how easily they burn, but reveals nothing about how patients refer to their skin tone,” Dr. Friedman explained. “We need to reset how we characterize and categorize skin types.”

Among those who assigned at least some importance to having a dermatologist of the same race or ethnicity, the most common reason was that such physicians “are better able to listen and relate to me.” Thirty percent of Black patients and 22% of Hispanic patients agreed with this statement. The perception that such physicians are better trained to treat non-White skin was the next most common reason.

The results of the survey emphasize the importance of ensuring that there is comprehensive training in managing all skin types and that physicians receive rigorous implicit bias and cultural sensitivity training in order to win patient trust, according to Dr. Friedman. He suggested that the perception that White physicians might not provide optimal care to non-White patients by study participants “has some validity. Structural racism in medicine is well-documented, and dermatologists have already begun to combat this on several fronts.”

In fact, the process of conducting and analyzing data from this survey proved to be its own lesson in sociocultural sensitivity, he said.

After a draft completed peer review and was accepted for publication, Dr. Friedman was confronted with numerous criticisms of the language that was used. In particular, one of his former residents, Misty Eleryan, MD, who is now a Mohs Fellow at the University of California, Los Angeles, was instrumental in pointing out problems. Ultimately, he withdrew the paper to rephrase the findings.

“It was not until then that I also learned that there is a JAAD Sensitivity Workgroup, which was very helpful in identifying issues we had overlooked,” Dr. Friedman said. For example, he had used the term “minorities” for non-White populations, which is not only inaccurate in many situations but has a pejorative undertone.

“It is important to recognize that the impact is more important than the intention,” said Dr. Friedman, who reported that he learned a lot in this process.

It is the need for this type of augmented sensitivity that the survey underscores, he added. He called for cultural sensitivity to be part of medical training to undo unrecognized bias, and said, “We need to understand how our patients perceive us.”

SOURCE: Friedman A et al. J Am Acad Dermatol. 2020 Sep 16;S0190-9622(20)32620-7. doi: 10.1016/j.jaad.2020.09.032.

Patients self-identified as non-White are far more likely to express a preference for dermatologic care from a physician of their own race or ethnicity, according to a patient survey.

In the survey, 42% of self-identified Black patients and 44% of self-identified Hispanic patients assigned some level of importance to the race or ethnicity of their dermatologist. Of patients self-identified as White, the figure was 2%, which was significantly lower (P less than .001).

Responses to the survey indicated that there is concern among non-White patients that White physicians are not fully sensitive to the clinical issues presented by their skin type. For example, 22% of Hispanic patients and 21% of Black patients agreed that a race-concordant physician would be better trained to treat their skin.

The results of the survey were recently published in a Research Letter in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology.

When patients were asked to agree or disagree with the statement that non-White patients receive the same quality of care as White patients, about a third disagreed, “but about half said they were unsure, which I interpret basically as a negative answer,” reported the lead author, Adam Friedman, MD, professor and interim chair of the department of dermatology at George Washington University, Washington.

“These data are a call to action. Certainly, we need to diversify our workforce to mirror the overall population, but we can also do more to improve training for dermatologic diseases across skin types,” Dr. Friedman said in an interview.

“Ensuring all skin types are represented in all dermatologic education, from resident book clubs to the national stage is but one step to making dermatology more inclusive and prepared to care for all patients,” he added.

Ninety-two patients receiving dermatology care at Dr. Friedman’s institution completed the survey. Fifty identified themselves as White, nine as Hispanic, and 33 as Black. Allowing patients to self-identify race was an important feature of this survey, according to Dr. Friedman.

“Something I really struggle with is terminology. Are race and ethnicity the appropriate terms when discussing different skin types and tones? It is so easy to misuse even validated tools. The Fitzpatrick Scale, for example, requires patients to relay how easily they burn, but reveals nothing about how patients refer to their skin tone,” Dr. Friedman explained. “We need to reset how we characterize and categorize skin types.”

Among those who assigned at least some importance to having a dermatologist of the same race or ethnicity, the most common reason was that such physicians “are better able to listen and relate to me.” Thirty percent of Black patients and 22% of Hispanic patients agreed with this statement. The perception that such physicians are better trained to treat non-White skin was the next most common reason.

The results of the survey emphasize the importance of ensuring that there is comprehensive training in managing all skin types and that physicians receive rigorous implicit bias and cultural sensitivity training in order to win patient trust, according to Dr. Friedman. He suggested that the perception that White physicians might not provide optimal care to non-White patients by study participants “has some validity. Structural racism in medicine is well-documented, and dermatologists have already begun to combat this on several fronts.”

In fact, the process of conducting and analyzing data from this survey proved to be its own lesson in sociocultural sensitivity, he said.

After a draft completed peer review and was accepted for publication, Dr. Friedman was confronted with numerous criticisms of the language that was used. In particular, one of his former residents, Misty Eleryan, MD, who is now a Mohs Fellow at the University of California, Los Angeles, was instrumental in pointing out problems. Ultimately, he withdrew the paper to rephrase the findings.

“It was not until then that I also learned that there is a JAAD Sensitivity Workgroup, which was very helpful in identifying issues we had overlooked,” Dr. Friedman said. For example, he had used the term “minorities” for non-White populations, which is not only inaccurate in many situations but has a pejorative undertone.

“It is important to recognize that the impact is more important than the intention,” said Dr. Friedman, who reported that he learned a lot in this process.

It is the need for this type of augmented sensitivity that the survey underscores, he added. He called for cultural sensitivity to be part of medical training to undo unrecognized bias, and said, “We need to understand how our patients perceive us.”

SOURCE: Friedman A et al. J Am Acad Dermatol. 2020 Sep 16;S0190-9622(20)32620-7. doi: 10.1016/j.jaad.2020.09.032.

Clinical encounters with female patients presenting with a STI offer a key opportunity for health care professionals to identify and prevent HIV through testing and prophylactic treatment, reported Kirk D. Henny, PhD, and colleagues of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In an effort to quantify HIV testing rates as well as the rate of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) among women with gonorrhea or syphilis, Dr. Henny and his colleagues performed a multivariate logistic regression analysis of 13,074 female patients aged 15-64 diagnosed with a STI in the absence of HIV. Data was pulled in 2017 from the IBM MarketScan commercial and Medicaid insurance databases, and the research was published in Obstetrics & Gynecology.
 

Medicaid patients were more likely to be tested for HIV

A total of 3,709 patients with commercial insurance were diagnosed with gonorrhea and 1,696 with syphilis. Among those with Medicaid, 6,172 were diagnosed with gonorrhea and 1,497 with syphilis. Medicaid patients diagnosed with either STI were more likely to be tested for HIV than the commercially insured patients. With an adjusted prevalence ratio, patients commercially insured with had either STI were more likely to be tested for HIV than patients who had no STI. Prophylactic treatment rates were similar in both insurance groups: 0.15% in the commercial insurance group and 0.26% in the Medicaid group. No patient from either group who was diagnosed with gonorrhea or syphilis and subsequently tested for HIV received pre-exposure prophylactic (PrEP) treatment.

STI diagnosis is a significant indicator of future HIV

Female patients diagnosed with either STI are more likely to contract HIV, the researchers noted. They cautioned that their findings of low HIV testing rates and the absence of prophylactic treatment means that “these missed opportunities for health care professionals to intervene with female patients diagnosed with gonorrhea or syphilis might have contributed to HIV infections that could have been averted.”

The researchers also pointed out that, in a recent analysis of pharmacy data, prophylactic prescribing for female patients with clinical indications for PrEP was 6.6%, less than one-third the coverage provided to male patients.

Future research should target understanding “individual and contextual factors associated with low HIV testing” and PrEP treatment in female patients, especially those with STIs, Dr. Henny and his colleagues advised.

In a separate interview, Constance Bohon, MD FACOG, observed: “The authors present data to document the low incidence of pre-exposure prophylaxis in women who are at substantial risk of acquiring HIV and possible causes for the low utilization of this treatment.” It is important to identify barriers to diagnosis, counseling, and treatment, she advised.

“Multicenter studies to determine the best methodologies to improve the identification, management, and treatment of these at-risk women need to be done, and the conclusions disseminated to health care providers caring for women,” Dr. Bohon said.
 

PrEP is an important, simple strategy for reducing HIV transmission

“Pre-exposure prophylaxis has been demonstrated to decrease HIV acquisition in those at risk by up to 90% when taken appropriately,” and yet prescribing rates are extremely low (2%-6%) in at-risk women and especially women of color. These disparities have only grown over time, with prophylactic prescriptions for women at 5% between 2012 and 2017, compared with 68% for men, Catherine S. Eppes, MD, MPH, and Jennifer McKinney, MD, MPH, said in a related editorial commenting on the Research Letter by Dr. Henny and colleagues in Obstetrics & Gynecology (2020 Dec;136[6]:1080-2).

Given the abundant research demonstrating the importance and ease of prescribing PrEP, the question remains: “why does preexposure prophylaxis uptake remain so low, especially for women and women of color? There are three important issues about preexposure prophylaxis raised by this study: the research gap, the implementation gap, and the effect of systemic racism and bias,” noted Dr. Eppes and Dr. McKinney.

Women constitute a significant portion of the population that would benefit from HIV-prevention strategies, yet they continue to be excluded from research, they noted. “Much focus on research into barriers and implementation interventions for preexposure prophylaxis have focused on men who have sex with men and transgender women,” the authors of the editorial wrote.

Most women eligible for treatment would be willing to consider it if they were aware of the option, but numerous studies have cited a lack of awareness, especially among high-risk women of color in the United States, Dr. Eppes and Dr. McKinney noted.

Clinicians also need to add it to their growing checklist of mandatory appointment discussion topics, the editorialists said. “We propose standardized inclusion of preexposure prophylaxis counseling during reproductive healthcare visits. This could be aided through an electronic medical record-based best practice advisory alert. … Standardized order sets with the medication and laboratory studies necessary for safe monitoring could facilitate ease of incorporating into routine visits,” they suggested.

“Preexposure prophylaxis is extremely effective in preventing HIV, is safe, and is the only prevention method that leaves control entirely in the hands of the female partner. As a specialty, we have a responsibility to make sure our patients know about this option,” the editorialists concluded.

The authors had no financial disclosures to report. Dr. Bohon had no conflicts of interest to report.
 

SOURCE: Henny KD et al. Obstet Gynecol. 2020 Dec;136(6):1083-5.

Clinical encounters with female patients presenting with a STI offer a key opportunity for health care professionals to identify and prevent HIV through testing and prophylactic treatment, reported Kirk D. Henny, PhD, and colleagues of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In an effort to quantify HIV testing rates as well as the rate of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) among women with gonorrhea or syphilis, Dr. Henny and his colleagues performed a multivariate logistic regression analysis of 13,074 female patients aged 15-64 diagnosed with a STI in the absence of HIV. Data was pulled in 2017 from the IBM MarketScan commercial and Medicaid insurance databases, and the research was published in Obstetrics & Gynecology.
 

Medicaid patients were more likely to be tested for HIV

A total of 3,709 patients with commercial insurance were diagnosed with gonorrhea and 1,696 with syphilis. Among those with Medicaid, 6,172 were diagnosed with gonorrhea and 1,497 with syphilis. Medicaid patients diagnosed with either STI were more likely to be tested for HIV than the commercially insured patients. With an adjusted prevalence ratio, patients commercially insured with had either STI were more likely to be tested for HIV than patients who had no STI. Prophylactic treatment rates were similar in both insurance groups: 0.15% in the commercial insurance group and 0.26% in the Medicaid group. No patient from either group who was diagnosed with gonorrhea or syphilis and subsequently tested for HIV received pre-exposure prophylactic (PrEP) treatment.

STI diagnosis is a significant indicator of future HIV

Female patients diagnosed with either STI are more likely to contract HIV, the researchers noted. They cautioned that their findings of low HIV testing rates and the absence of prophylactic treatment means that “these missed opportunities for health care professionals to intervene with female patients diagnosed with gonorrhea or syphilis might have contributed to HIV infections that could have been averted.”

The researchers also pointed out that, in a recent analysis of pharmacy data, prophylactic prescribing for female patients with clinical indications for PrEP was 6.6%, less than one-third the coverage provided to male patients.

Future research should target understanding “individual and contextual factors associated with low HIV testing” and PrEP treatment in female patients, especially those with STIs, Dr. Henny and his colleagues advised.

In a separate interview, Constance Bohon, MD FACOG, observed: “The authors present data to document the low incidence of pre-exposure prophylaxis in women who are at substantial risk of acquiring HIV and possible causes for the low utilization of this treatment.” It is important to identify barriers to diagnosis, counseling, and treatment, she advised.

“Multicenter studies to determine the best methodologies to improve the identification, management, and treatment of these at-risk women need to be done, and the conclusions disseminated to health care providers caring for women,” Dr. Bohon said.
 

PrEP is an important, simple strategy for reducing HIV transmission

“Pre-exposure prophylaxis has been demonstrated to decrease HIV acquisition in those at risk by up to 90% when taken appropriately,” and yet prescribing rates are extremely low (2%-6%) in at-risk women and especially women of color. These disparities have only grown over time, with prophylactic prescriptions for women at 5% between 2012 and 2017, compared with 68% for men, Catherine S. Eppes, MD, MPH, and Jennifer McKinney, MD, MPH, said in a related editorial commenting on the Research Letter by Dr. Henny and colleagues in Obstetrics & Gynecology (2020 Dec;136[6]:1080-2).

Given the abundant research demonstrating the importance and ease of prescribing PrEP, the question remains: “why does preexposure prophylaxis uptake remain so low, especially for women and women of color? There are three important issues about preexposure prophylaxis raised by this study: the research gap, the implementation gap, and the effect of systemic racism and bias,” noted Dr. Eppes and Dr. McKinney.

Women constitute a significant portion of the population that would benefit from HIV-prevention strategies, yet they continue to be excluded from research, they noted. “Much focus on research into barriers and implementation interventions for preexposure prophylaxis have focused on men who have sex with men and transgender women,” the authors of the editorial wrote.

Most women eligible for treatment would be willing to consider it if they were aware of the option, but numerous studies have cited a lack of awareness, especially among high-risk women of color in the United States, Dr. Eppes and Dr. McKinney noted.

Clinicians also need to add it to their growing checklist of mandatory appointment discussion topics, the editorialists said. “We propose standardized inclusion of preexposure prophylaxis counseling during reproductive healthcare visits. This could be aided through an electronic medical record-based best practice advisory alert. … Standardized order sets with the medication and laboratory studies necessary for safe monitoring could facilitate ease of incorporating into routine visits,” they suggested.

“Preexposure prophylaxis is extremely effective in preventing HIV, is safe, and is the only prevention method that leaves control entirely in the hands of the female partner. As a specialty, we have a responsibility to make sure our patients know about this option,” the editorialists concluded.

The authors had no financial disclosures to report. Dr. Bohon had no conflicts of interest to report.
 

SOURCE: Henny KD et al. Obstet Gynecol. 2020 Dec;136(6):1083-5.

Clinical encounters with female patients presenting with a STI offer a key opportunity for health care professionals to identify and prevent HIV through testing and prophylactic treatment, reported Kirk D. Henny, PhD, and colleagues of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In an effort to quantify HIV testing rates as well as the rate of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) among women with gonorrhea or syphilis, Dr. Henny and his colleagues performed a multivariate logistic regression analysis of 13,074 female patients aged 15-64 diagnosed with a STI in the absence of HIV. Data was pulled in 2017 from the IBM MarketScan commercial and Medicaid insurance databases, and the research was published in Obstetrics & Gynecology.
 

Medicaid patients were more likely to be tested for HIV

A total of 3,709 patients with commercial insurance were diagnosed with gonorrhea and 1,696 with syphilis. Among those with Medicaid, 6,172 were diagnosed with gonorrhea and 1,497 with syphilis. Medicaid patients diagnosed with either STI were more likely to be tested for HIV than the commercially insured patients. With an adjusted prevalence ratio, patients commercially insured with had either STI were more likely to be tested for HIV than patients who had no STI. Prophylactic treatment rates were similar in both insurance groups: 0.15% in the commercial insurance group and 0.26% in the Medicaid group. No patient from either group who was diagnosed with gonorrhea or syphilis and subsequently tested for HIV received pre-exposure prophylactic (PrEP) treatment.

STI diagnosis is a significant indicator of future HIV

Female patients diagnosed with either STI are more likely to contract HIV, the researchers noted. They cautioned that their findings of low HIV testing rates and the absence of prophylactic treatment means that “these missed opportunities for health care professionals to intervene with female patients diagnosed with gonorrhea or syphilis might have contributed to HIV infections that could have been averted.”

The researchers also pointed out that, in a recent analysis of pharmacy data, prophylactic prescribing for female patients with clinical indications for PrEP was 6.6%, less than one-third the coverage provided to male patients.

Future research should target understanding “individual and contextual factors associated with low HIV testing” and PrEP treatment in female patients, especially those with STIs, Dr. Henny and his colleagues advised.

In a separate interview, Constance Bohon, MD FACOG, observed: “The authors present data to document the low incidence of pre-exposure prophylaxis in women who are at substantial risk of acquiring HIV and possible causes for the low utilization of this treatment.” It is important to identify barriers to diagnosis, counseling, and treatment, she advised.

“Multicenter studies to determine the best methodologies to improve the identification, management, and treatment of these at-risk women need to be done, and the conclusions disseminated to health care providers caring for women,” Dr. Bohon said.
 

PrEP is an important, simple strategy for reducing HIV transmission

“Pre-exposure prophylaxis has been demonstrated to decrease HIV acquisition in those at risk by up to 90% when taken appropriately,” and yet prescribing rates are extremely low (2%-6%) in at-risk women and especially women of color. These disparities have only grown over time, with prophylactic prescriptions for women at 5% between 2012 and 2017, compared with 68% for men, Catherine S. Eppes, MD, MPH, and Jennifer McKinney, MD, MPH, said in a related editorial commenting on the Research Letter by Dr. Henny and colleagues in Obstetrics & Gynecology (2020 Dec;136[6]:1080-2).

Given the abundant research demonstrating the importance and ease of prescribing PrEP, the question remains: “why does preexposure prophylaxis uptake remain so low, especially for women and women of color? There are three important issues about preexposure prophylaxis raised by this study: the research gap, the implementation gap, and the effect of systemic racism and bias,” noted Dr. Eppes and Dr. McKinney.

Women constitute a significant portion of the population that would benefit from HIV-prevention strategies, yet they continue to be excluded from research, they noted. “Much focus on research into barriers and implementation interventions for preexposure prophylaxis have focused on men who have sex with men and transgender women,” the authors of the editorial wrote.

Most women eligible for treatment would be willing to consider it if they were aware of the option, but numerous studies have cited a lack of awareness, especially among high-risk women of color in the United States, Dr. Eppes and Dr. McKinney noted.

Clinicians also need to add it to their growing checklist of mandatory appointment discussion topics, the editorialists said. “We propose standardized inclusion of preexposure prophylaxis counseling during reproductive healthcare visits. This could be aided through an electronic medical record-based best practice advisory alert. … Standardized order sets with the medication and laboratory studies necessary for safe monitoring could facilitate ease of incorporating into routine visits,” they suggested.

“Preexposure prophylaxis is extremely effective in preventing HIV, is safe, and is the only prevention method that leaves control entirely in the hands of the female partner. As a specialty, we have a responsibility to make sure our patients know about this option,” the editorialists concluded.

The authors had no financial disclosures to report. Dr. Bohon had no conflicts of interest to report.
 

SOURCE: Henny KD et al. Obstet Gynecol. 2020 Dec;136(6):1083-5.

Another use for the intense pulsed-light device, pulsed-dye laser, and potassium titanyl phosphate laser in clinical practice is for treating patients who have dry eye, even if you are not an ophthalmologist, suggests R. Rox Anderson, MD.

“I’ve been doing this in my practice for a number of years and it’s quite gratifying,” Dr. Anderson, a dermatologist who directs the Wellman Center for Photomedicine at Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, said during a virtual course on laser and aesthetic skin therapy. “You treat the periorbital skin, mostly under the eye, just as if you were treating telangiectasia rosacea. The meibomian glands under the upper eyelid that cause this disease are sebaceous glands, and most of the people with dry eye have rosacea.”

In a retrospective noncomparative, interventional case series, 78 patients with severe dry eye syndrome were treated with intense pulsed-light therapy and gland expression at a single outpatient clinic over 30 months. Physician-judged improvement in dry eye tear breakup time was found for 87% of patients with an average of seven treatment visits and four maintenance visits, while 93% of patients reported posttreatment satisfaction with the degree of dry eye syndrome symptoms. More information about the approach were published in Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science and Current Opinion in Ophthalmology.

“What’s gratifying here is that most patients will get about 2 months of relief after a single treatment,” Dr. Anderson said. “They are very happy – some of the happiest patients in my practice. Many ophthalmologists don’t have the technology, so I think you can do this depending on your local referral system.”

Light-based approaches are also making promising inroads in cancer treatment. A recent study led by Martin Purschke, PhD, at the Wellman Center evaluated the use of a novel radio-phototherapy approach for killing cancer cells. The center of solid tissue tumors that are treated with radiotherapy is hypoxic, Dr. Anderson explained, “and oxygen is typically located around the perimeter of the tumor. After a radiation therapy treatment, you kill only the outer portion of it, and then the remaining cells grow back, and you end up with the same tumor. This is why you have to do radiation therapy over and over again. In contrast, if you add scintillating nanoparticles, which are particles with a very high C number atoms in them that pick up the x-ray photon and then emit many UV photons from one x-ray photon, they are very efficient at converting x-ray energy to UV energy.” The x-ray, he added, “generates UV light, and the UV light kills the tumor. We’re hoping that we can make a dent in radiotherapy this way.”

Dr. Anderson predicted that fiber lasers, which are highly advanced for industrial applications, will play an increasing role in dermatology and in other areas of medicine. “There are not a new kid on the block anymore but fiber lasers are relatively new to medicine,” he said during the meeting, which was sponsored by Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, and the Wellman Center for Photomedicine. “We are seeing incredible capabilities with fiber lasers: essentially any wavelength, any power, any pulse duration you want. The lasers are efficient, small, rugged, and their lifetime exceeds your lifetime. They are likely to displace many of our old lasers in dermatology. I don’t know when, but I know it will happen.”

He reported having received research funding and/or consulting fees from numerous device and pharmaceutical companies.

[email protected]

Another use for the intense pulsed-light device, pulsed-dye laser, and potassium titanyl phosphate laser in clinical practice is for treating patients who have dry eye, even if you are not an ophthalmologist, suggests R. Rox Anderson, MD.

“I’ve been doing this in my practice for a number of years and it’s quite gratifying,” Dr. Anderson, a dermatologist who directs the Wellman Center for Photomedicine at Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, said during a virtual course on laser and aesthetic skin therapy. “You treat the periorbital skin, mostly under the eye, just as if you were treating telangiectasia rosacea. The meibomian glands under the upper eyelid that cause this disease are sebaceous glands, and most of the people with dry eye have rosacea.”

In a retrospective noncomparative, interventional case series, 78 patients with severe dry eye syndrome were treated with intense pulsed-light therapy and gland expression at a single outpatient clinic over 30 months. Physician-judged improvement in dry eye tear breakup time was found for 87% of patients with an average of seven treatment visits and four maintenance visits, while 93% of patients reported posttreatment satisfaction with the degree of dry eye syndrome symptoms. More information about the approach were published in Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science and Current Opinion in Ophthalmology.

“What’s gratifying here is that most patients will get about 2 months of relief after a single treatment,” Dr. Anderson said. “They are very happy – some of the happiest patients in my practice. Many ophthalmologists don’t have the technology, so I think you can do this depending on your local referral system.”

Light-based approaches are also making promising inroads in cancer treatment. A recent study led by Martin Purschke, PhD, at the Wellman Center evaluated the use of a novel radio-phototherapy approach for killing cancer cells. The center of solid tissue tumors that are treated with radiotherapy is hypoxic, Dr. Anderson explained, “and oxygen is typically located around the perimeter of the tumor. After a radiation therapy treatment, you kill only the outer portion of it, and then the remaining cells grow back, and you end up with the same tumor. This is why you have to do radiation therapy over and over again. In contrast, if you add scintillating nanoparticles, which are particles with a very high C number atoms in them that pick up the x-ray photon and then emit many UV photons from one x-ray photon, they are very efficient at converting x-ray energy to UV energy.” The x-ray, he added, “generates UV light, and the UV light kills the tumor. We’re hoping that we can make a dent in radiotherapy this way.”

Dr. Anderson predicted that fiber lasers, which are highly advanced for industrial applications, will play an increasing role in dermatology and in other areas of medicine. “There are not a new kid on the block anymore but fiber lasers are relatively new to medicine,” he said during the meeting, which was sponsored by Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, and the Wellman Center for Photomedicine. “We are seeing incredible capabilities with fiber lasers: essentially any wavelength, any power, any pulse duration you want. The lasers are efficient, small, rugged, and their lifetime exceeds your lifetime. They are likely to displace many of our old lasers in dermatology. I don’t know when, but I know it will happen.”

He reported having received research funding and/or consulting fees from numerous device and pharmaceutical companies.

[email protected]

Another use for the intense pulsed-light device, pulsed-dye laser, and potassium titanyl phosphate laser in clinical practice is for treating patients who have dry eye, even if you are not an ophthalmologist, suggests R. Rox Anderson, MD.

“I’ve been doing this in my practice for a number of years and it’s quite gratifying,” Dr. Anderson, a dermatologist who directs the Wellman Center for Photomedicine at Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, said during a virtual course on laser and aesthetic skin therapy. “You treat the periorbital skin, mostly under the eye, just as if you were treating telangiectasia rosacea. The meibomian glands under the upper eyelid that cause this disease are sebaceous glands, and most of the people with dry eye have rosacea.”

In a retrospective noncomparative, interventional case series, 78 patients with severe dry eye syndrome were treated with intense pulsed-light therapy and gland expression at a single outpatient clinic over 30 months. Physician-judged improvement in dry eye tear breakup time was found for 87% of patients with an average of seven treatment visits and four maintenance visits, while 93% of patients reported posttreatment satisfaction with the degree of dry eye syndrome symptoms. More information about the approach were published in Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science and Current Opinion in Ophthalmology.

“What’s gratifying here is that most patients will get about 2 months of relief after a single treatment,” Dr. Anderson said. “They are very happy – some of the happiest patients in my practice. Many ophthalmologists don’t have the technology, so I think you can do this depending on your local referral system.”

Light-based approaches are also making promising inroads in cancer treatment. A recent study led by Martin Purschke, PhD, at the Wellman Center evaluated the use of a novel radio-phototherapy approach for killing cancer cells. The center of solid tissue tumors that are treated with radiotherapy is hypoxic, Dr. Anderson explained, “and oxygen is typically located around the perimeter of the tumor. After a radiation therapy treatment, you kill only the outer portion of it, and then the remaining cells grow back, and you end up with the same tumor. This is why you have to do radiation therapy over and over again. In contrast, if you add scintillating nanoparticles, which are particles with a very high C number atoms in them that pick up the x-ray photon and then emit many UV photons from one x-ray photon, they are very efficient at converting x-ray energy to UV energy.” The x-ray, he added, “generates UV light, and the UV light kills the tumor. We’re hoping that we can make a dent in radiotherapy this way.”

Dr. Anderson predicted that fiber lasers, which are highly advanced for industrial applications, will play an increasing role in dermatology and in other areas of medicine. “There are not a new kid on the block anymore but fiber lasers are relatively new to medicine,” he said during the meeting, which was sponsored by Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, and the Wellman Center for Photomedicine. “We are seeing incredible capabilities with fiber lasers: essentially any wavelength, any power, any pulse duration you want. The lasers are efficient, small, rugged, and their lifetime exceeds your lifetime. They are likely to displace many of our old lasers in dermatology. I don’t know when, but I know it will happen.”

He reported having received research funding and/or consulting fees from numerous device and pharmaceutical companies.

[email protected]

On Monday, members of an influential federal panel delved into the challenges ahead in deciding who will get the first doses of COVID-19 vaccines, including questions about which healthcare workers need those initial vaccinations the most.

The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) did not take any votes or seek to establish formal positions. Instead, the meeting served as a forum for experts to discuss the thorny issues ahead. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) could make a decision next month regarding clearance for the first COVID-19 vaccine.

An FDA advisory committee will meet December 10 to review the request for emergency use authorization (EUA) of a COVID-19 vaccine from Pfizer, in partnership with BioNTech. Moderna Inc said on November 16 that it expects to soon ask the FDA for an EUA of its rival COVID vaccine.

ACIP will face a two-part task after the FDA clears COVID-19 vaccines, said Nancy Messonnier, MD, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. ACIP will need to first decide whether to recommend use of the vaccine and then address the “complicated and difficult” question of which groups should get the initial limited quantities.

“There aren’t any perfect decisions,” she told the ACIP members. “I know this is something that most of you didn’t anticipate doing, making these kinds of huge decisions in the midst of a pandemic.”

There has been considerable public discussion of prioritization of COVID-19 vaccines, including a set of recommendations offered by a special committee created by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. In addition, CDC staff and members of ACIP outlined what they termed the “four ethical principles” meant to guide these decisions in a November 23 report in the agency’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. These four principles are to maximize benefits and minimize harms; promote justice; mitigate health inequities; and promote transparency.

But as the issuing of the first EUA nears, it falls to ACIP to move beyond endorsing broad goals. The panel will need to make decisions as to which groups will have to wait for COVID-19 vaccines.

ACIP members on Monday delved into these kinds of more detailed questions, using a proposed three-stage model as a discussion point.

In phase 1a of this model, healthcare workers and residents of long-term care facilities would be the first people to be vaccinated. Phase 1b would include those deemed essential workers, including police officers, firefighters, and those in education, transportation, food, and agriculture sectors. Phase 1c would include adults with high-risk medical conditions and those aged 65 years and older.

ACIP member Grace M. Lee, MD, MPH, of Stanford University, Stanford, California, questioned whether healthcare workers who are not seeing patients in person should wait to get the vaccines. There has been a marked rise in the use of telehealth during the pandemic, which has spared some clinicians from in-person COVID-19 patient visits in their practices.

“Close partnership with our public health colleagues will be critically important to make sure that we are not trying to vaccinate 100% of our healthcare workforce, if some proportion of our workforce can work from home,” Lee said.

ACIP member Pablo Sánchez, MD, of the Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, concurred. Some clinicians, he noted, may have better access to personal protective equipment than others, he said.

“Unfortunately, not all healthcare workers are equal in terms of risk,” Sánchez said. “Within institutions, we’re going to have to prioritize which ones will get” the vaccine.

Clinicians may also make judgments about their own risk and need for early access to COVID-19 vaccinations, Sánchez said.

“I’m 66, and I’d rather give it to somebody much older and sicker than me,” he said.
 

Broader access

Fairly large populations will essentially be competing for limited doses of the first vaccines to reach the market.

The overlap is significant in the four priority groups put forward by CDC. The CDC staff estimated that about 21 million people would fall into the healthcare personnel category, which includes hospital staff, pharmacists, and those working in long-term care facilities. There are about 87 million people in the essential workers groups. More than 100 million adults in the United States, such as those with diabetes and cancers, fall into the high-risk medical conditions group. Another 53 million people are aged 65 and older.

Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar on November 18 said the federal government expects to have about 40 million doses of these two vaccines by the end of December, which is enough to provide the two-dose regimen for about 20 million. If all goes as expected, Pfizer and Moderna will ramp up production.

Moderna has said that it expects by the end of this year to have approximately 20 million doses of its vaccine ready to ship in the United States and that it is on track to manufacture 500 million to 1 billion doses globally in 2021. Pfizer and BioNTech have said they expect to produce globally up to 50 million doses in 2020 and up to 1.3 billion doses by the end of 2021.

At the Monday meeting, several ACIP panelists stressed the need to ensure that essential workers get early doses of vaccines.

In many cases, these workers serve in jobs with significant public interaction and live in poor communities. They put themselves and their families at risk. Many of them lack the resources to take precautions available to those better able to isolate, said ACIP member Beth Bell, MD, MPH, of the University of Washington, Seattle, Washington.

“These essential workers are out there putting themselves at risk to allow the rest of us to socially distance,” she said. “Recognizing that not all of them may want to be vaccinated at this stage, we need to provide them with the opportunity early on in the process.”

In Bell’s view, the initial rollout of COVID-19 vaccines will send an important message about sharing this resource.

“If we’re serious about valuing equity, we need to have that baked in early on in the vaccination program,” she said.

Bell also said she was in favor of including people living in nursing homes in the initial wave of vaccinations. Concerns were raised about the frailty of this population.

“Given the mortality impact on the healthcare system from the number of nursing home residents that have been dying, I think on balance it makes sense to include them in phase 1a,” Bell said.

Other ACIP panelists said missteps with early vaccination of people in nursing homes could undermine faith in the treatments. Because of the ages and medical conditions of people in nursing homes, many of them may die after receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. Such deaths would not be associated with vaccine, but the medical community would not yet have evidence to disprove a connection.

There could be a backlash, with people falsely linking the death of a grandparent to the vaccine.

Fellow ACIP member Robert L. Atmar, MD, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, was among those who had raised concerns about including people living in long-term care facilities in phase 1a. He said there are not yet enough data to judge the balance of benefits and harms of vaccination for this population.

The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are “reactagenic,” meaning people may not feel well in the days after receiving the shots. The symptoms could lead to additional health evaluations of older people in nursing homes as clinicians try to figure out whether the patient’s reactions to the vaccine are caused by some condition or infection, Atmar said.

“Those of us who see these patients in the hospital recognize that there are often medical interventions that are done in the pursuit of a diagnosis, of a change in clinical status, that in and of themselves can lead to harm,” Atmar said.

Clinicians likely will have to encourage their patients of all ages to receive second doses of COVID-19 vaccines, despite the malaise they may provoke.

“We really need to make patients aware that this is not going to be a walk in the park. I mean, they’re going to know they had a vaccine, they’re probably not going to feel wonderful, but they’ve got to come back for that second dose,” said Sandra Adamson Fryhofer, MD, who represented the American Medical Association.

ACIP is expected to meet again to offer specific recommendations on the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. ACIP’s recommendations trigger reimbursement processes, Azar said at a Tuesday press conference. ACIP’s work will inform decisions made by the federal government and governors about deploying shipments of COVID-19 vaccines, he said.

“At the end of the day, that is a decision, though, of the US government to make, which is where to recommend the prioritization,” Azar said. “It will be our nation’s governors in implementing the distribution plans to tell us” where to ship the vaccine.

This article first appeared on Medscape.com.

On Monday, members of an influential federal panel delved into the challenges ahead in deciding who will get the first doses of COVID-19 vaccines, including questions about which healthcare workers need those initial vaccinations the most.

The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) did not take any votes or seek to establish formal positions. Instead, the meeting served as a forum for experts to discuss the thorny issues ahead. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) could make a decision next month regarding clearance for the first COVID-19 vaccine.

An FDA advisory committee will meet December 10 to review the request for emergency use authorization (EUA) of a COVID-19 vaccine from Pfizer, in partnership with BioNTech. Moderna Inc said on November 16 that it expects to soon ask the FDA for an EUA of its rival COVID vaccine.

ACIP will face a two-part task after the FDA clears COVID-19 vaccines, said Nancy Messonnier, MD, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. ACIP will need to first decide whether to recommend use of the vaccine and then address the “complicated and difficult” question of which groups should get the initial limited quantities.

“There aren’t any perfect decisions,” she told the ACIP members. “I know this is something that most of you didn’t anticipate doing, making these kinds of huge decisions in the midst of a pandemic.”

There has been considerable public discussion of prioritization of COVID-19 vaccines, including a set of recommendations offered by a special committee created by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. In addition, CDC staff and members of ACIP outlined what they termed the “four ethical principles” meant to guide these decisions in a November 23 report in the agency’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. These four principles are to maximize benefits and minimize harms; promote justice; mitigate health inequities; and promote transparency.

But as the issuing of the first EUA nears, it falls to ACIP to move beyond endorsing broad goals. The panel will need to make decisions as to which groups will have to wait for COVID-19 vaccines.

ACIP members on Monday delved into these kinds of more detailed questions, using a proposed three-stage model as a discussion point.

In phase 1a of this model, healthcare workers and residents of long-term care facilities would be the first people to be vaccinated. Phase 1b would include those deemed essential workers, including police officers, firefighters, and those in education, transportation, food, and agriculture sectors. Phase 1c would include adults with high-risk medical conditions and those aged 65 years and older.

ACIP member Grace M. Lee, MD, MPH, of Stanford University, Stanford, California, questioned whether healthcare workers who are not seeing patients in person should wait to get the vaccines. There has been a marked rise in the use of telehealth during the pandemic, which has spared some clinicians from in-person COVID-19 patient visits in their practices.

“Close partnership with our public health colleagues will be critically important to make sure that we are not trying to vaccinate 100% of our healthcare workforce, if some proportion of our workforce can work from home,” Lee said.

ACIP member Pablo Sánchez, MD, of the Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, concurred. Some clinicians, he noted, may have better access to personal protective equipment than others, he said.

“Unfortunately, not all healthcare workers are equal in terms of risk,” Sánchez said. “Within institutions, we’re going to have to prioritize which ones will get” the vaccine.

Clinicians may also make judgments about their own risk and need for early access to COVID-19 vaccinations, Sánchez said.

“I’m 66, and I’d rather give it to somebody much older and sicker than me,” he said.
 

Broader access

Fairly large populations will essentially be competing for limited doses of the first vaccines to reach the market.

The overlap is significant in the four priority groups put forward by CDC. The CDC staff estimated that about 21 million people would fall into the healthcare personnel category, which includes hospital staff, pharmacists, and those working in long-term care facilities. There are about 87 million people in the essential workers groups. More than 100 million adults in the United States, such as those with diabetes and cancers, fall into the high-risk medical conditions group. Another 53 million people are aged 65 and older.

Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar on November 18 said the federal government expects to have about 40 million doses of these two vaccines by the end of December, which is enough to provide the two-dose regimen for about 20 million. If all goes as expected, Pfizer and Moderna will ramp up production.

Moderna has said that it expects by the end of this year to have approximately 20 million doses of its vaccine ready to ship in the United States and that it is on track to manufacture 500 million to 1 billion doses globally in 2021. Pfizer and BioNTech have said they expect to produce globally up to 50 million doses in 2020 and up to 1.3 billion doses by the end of 2021.

At the Monday meeting, several ACIP panelists stressed the need to ensure that essential workers get early doses of vaccines.

In many cases, these workers serve in jobs with significant public interaction and live in poor communities. They put themselves and their families at risk. Many of them lack the resources to take precautions available to those better able to isolate, said ACIP member Beth Bell, MD, MPH, of the University of Washington, Seattle, Washington.

“These essential workers are out there putting themselves at risk to allow the rest of us to socially distance,” she said. “Recognizing that not all of them may want to be vaccinated at this stage, we need to provide them with the opportunity early on in the process.”

In Bell’s view, the initial rollout of COVID-19 vaccines will send an important message about sharing this resource.

“If we’re serious about valuing equity, we need to have that baked in early on in the vaccination program,” she said.

Bell also said she was in favor of including people living in nursing homes in the initial wave of vaccinations. Concerns were raised about the frailty of this population.

“Given the mortality impact on the healthcare system from the number of nursing home residents that have been dying, I think on balance it makes sense to include them in phase 1a,” Bell said.

Other ACIP panelists said missteps with early vaccination of people in nursing homes could undermine faith in the treatments. Because of the ages and medical conditions of people in nursing homes, many of them may die after receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. Such deaths would not be associated with vaccine, but the medical community would not yet have evidence to disprove a connection.

There could be a backlash, with people falsely linking the death of a grandparent to the vaccine.

Fellow ACIP member Robert L. Atmar, MD, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, was among those who had raised concerns about including people living in long-term care facilities in phase 1a. He said there are not yet enough data to judge the balance of benefits and harms of vaccination for this population.

The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are “reactagenic,” meaning people may not feel well in the days after receiving the shots. The symptoms could lead to additional health evaluations of older people in nursing homes as clinicians try to figure out whether the patient’s reactions to the vaccine are caused by some condition or infection, Atmar said.

“Those of us who see these patients in the hospital recognize that there are often medical interventions that are done in the pursuit of a diagnosis, of a change in clinical status, that in and of themselves can lead to harm,” Atmar said.

Clinicians likely will have to encourage their patients of all ages to receive second doses of COVID-19 vaccines, despite the malaise they may provoke.

“We really need to make patients aware that this is not going to be a walk in the park. I mean, they’re going to know they had a vaccine, they’re probably not going to feel wonderful, but they’ve got to come back for that second dose,” said Sandra Adamson Fryhofer, MD, who represented the American Medical Association.

ACIP is expected to meet again to offer specific recommendations on the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. ACIP’s recommendations trigger reimbursement processes, Azar said at a Tuesday press conference. ACIP’s work will inform decisions made by the federal government and governors about deploying shipments of COVID-19 vaccines, he said.

“At the end of the day, that is a decision, though, of the US government to make, which is where to recommend the prioritization,” Azar said. “It will be our nation’s governors in implementing the distribution plans to tell us” where to ship the vaccine.

This article first appeared on Medscape.com.

On Monday, members of an influential federal panel delved into the challenges ahead in deciding who will get the first doses of COVID-19 vaccines, including questions about which healthcare workers need those initial vaccinations the most.

The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) did not take any votes or seek to establish formal positions. Instead, the meeting served as a forum for experts to discuss the thorny issues ahead. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) could make a decision next month regarding clearance for the first COVID-19 vaccine.

An FDA advisory committee will meet December 10 to review the request for emergency use authorization (EUA) of a COVID-19 vaccine from Pfizer, in partnership with BioNTech. Moderna Inc said on November 16 that it expects to soon ask the FDA for an EUA of its rival COVID vaccine.

ACIP will face a two-part task after the FDA clears COVID-19 vaccines, said Nancy Messonnier, MD, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. ACIP will need to first decide whether to recommend use of the vaccine and then address the “complicated and difficult” question of which groups should get the initial limited quantities.

“There aren’t any perfect decisions,” she told the ACIP members. “I know this is something that most of you didn’t anticipate doing, making these kinds of huge decisions in the midst of a pandemic.”

There has been considerable public discussion of prioritization of COVID-19 vaccines, including a set of recommendations offered by a special committee created by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. In addition, CDC staff and members of ACIP outlined what they termed the “four ethical principles” meant to guide these decisions in a November 23 report in the agency’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. These four principles are to maximize benefits and minimize harms; promote justice; mitigate health inequities; and promote transparency.

But as the issuing of the first EUA nears, it falls to ACIP to move beyond endorsing broad goals. The panel will need to make decisions as to which groups will have to wait for COVID-19 vaccines.

ACIP members on Monday delved into these kinds of more detailed questions, using a proposed three-stage model as a discussion point.

In phase 1a of this model, healthcare workers and residents of long-term care facilities would be the first people to be vaccinated. Phase 1b would include those deemed essential workers, including police officers, firefighters, and those in education, transportation, food, and agriculture sectors. Phase 1c would include adults with high-risk medical conditions and those aged 65 years and older.

ACIP member Grace M. Lee, MD, MPH, of Stanford University, Stanford, California, questioned whether healthcare workers who are not seeing patients in person should wait to get the vaccines. There has been a marked rise in the use of telehealth during the pandemic, which has spared some clinicians from in-person COVID-19 patient visits in their practices.

“Close partnership with our public health colleagues will be critically important to make sure that we are not trying to vaccinate 100% of our healthcare workforce, if some proportion of our workforce can work from home,” Lee said.

ACIP member Pablo Sánchez, MD, of the Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, concurred. Some clinicians, he noted, may have better access to personal protective equipment than others, he said.

“Unfortunately, not all healthcare workers are equal in terms of risk,” Sánchez said. “Within institutions, we’re going to have to prioritize which ones will get” the vaccine.

Clinicians may also make judgments about their own risk and need for early access to COVID-19 vaccinations, Sánchez said.

“I’m 66, and I’d rather give it to somebody much older and sicker than me,” he said.
 

Broader access

Fairly large populations will essentially be competing for limited doses of the first vaccines to reach the market.

The overlap is significant in the four priority groups put forward by CDC. The CDC staff estimated that about 21 million people would fall into the healthcare personnel category, which includes hospital staff, pharmacists, and those working in long-term care facilities. There are about 87 million people in the essential workers groups. More than 100 million adults in the United States, such as those with diabetes and cancers, fall into the high-risk medical conditions group. Another 53 million people are aged 65 and older.

Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar on November 18 said the federal government expects to have about 40 million doses of these two vaccines by the end of December, which is enough to provide the two-dose regimen for about 20 million. If all goes as expected, Pfizer and Moderna will ramp up production.

Moderna has said that it expects by the end of this year to have approximately 20 million doses of its vaccine ready to ship in the United States and that it is on track to manufacture 500 million to 1 billion doses globally in 2021. Pfizer and BioNTech have said they expect to produce globally up to 50 million doses in 2020 and up to 1.3 billion doses by the end of 2021.

At the Monday meeting, several ACIP panelists stressed the need to ensure that essential workers get early doses of vaccines.

In many cases, these workers serve in jobs with significant public interaction and live in poor communities. They put themselves and their families at risk. Many of them lack the resources to take precautions available to those better able to isolate, said ACIP member Beth Bell, MD, MPH, of the University of Washington, Seattle, Washington.

“These essential workers are out there putting themselves at risk to allow the rest of us to socially distance,” she said. “Recognizing that not all of them may want to be vaccinated at this stage, we need to provide them with the opportunity early on in the process.”

In Bell’s view, the initial rollout of COVID-19 vaccines will send an important message about sharing this resource.

“If we’re serious about valuing equity, we need to have that baked in early on in the vaccination program,” she said.

Bell also said she was in favor of including people living in nursing homes in the initial wave of vaccinations. Concerns were raised about the frailty of this population.

“Given the mortality impact on the healthcare system from the number of nursing home residents that have been dying, I think on balance it makes sense to include them in phase 1a,” Bell said.

Other ACIP panelists said missteps with early vaccination of people in nursing homes could undermine faith in the treatments. Because of the ages and medical conditions of people in nursing homes, many of them may die after receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. Such deaths would not be associated with vaccine, but the medical community would not yet have evidence to disprove a connection.

There could be a backlash, with people falsely linking the death of a grandparent to the vaccine.

Fellow ACIP member Robert L. Atmar, MD, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, was among those who had raised concerns about including people living in long-term care facilities in phase 1a. He said there are not yet enough data to judge the balance of benefits and harms of vaccination for this population.

The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are “reactagenic,” meaning people may not feel well in the days after receiving the shots. The symptoms could lead to additional health evaluations of older people in nursing homes as clinicians try to figure out whether the patient’s reactions to the vaccine are caused by some condition or infection, Atmar said.

“Those of us who see these patients in the hospital recognize that there are often medical interventions that are done in the pursuit of a diagnosis, of a change in clinical status, that in and of themselves can lead to harm,” Atmar said.

Clinicians likely will have to encourage their patients of all ages to receive second doses of COVID-19 vaccines, despite the malaise they may provoke.

“We really need to make patients aware that this is not going to be a walk in the park. I mean, they’re going to know they had a vaccine, they’re probably not going to feel wonderful, but they’ve got to come back for that second dose,” said Sandra Adamson Fryhofer, MD, who represented the American Medical Association.

ACIP is expected to meet again to offer specific recommendations on the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. ACIP’s recommendations trigger reimbursement processes, Azar said at a Tuesday press conference. ACIP’s work will inform decisions made by the federal government and governors about deploying shipments of COVID-19 vaccines, he said.

“At the end of the day, that is a decision, though, of the US government to make, which is where to recommend the prioritization,” Azar said. “It will be our nation’s governors in implementing the distribution plans to tell us” where to ship the vaccine.

This article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Medication overuse headache presents difficult challenges for both patients and physicians. Physicians worry about episodic migraine converting to chronic daily headache, but this worry can also lead to under-treatment and even stigmatization of patients who aggressively treat their symptoms.

These concerns and others were a topic of a debate at the Headache Cooperative of New England’s 20th Annual HCNE Boston Fall Headache Symposium, which was conducted virtually.

The International Classification of Headache-3 (ICHD-3) defines medication overuse headache as a headache that occurs on 15 or more days per month in a patient with pre-existing primary headache, and that develops because of regular overuse of acute or symptomatic headache medication. The ICHD-3 also says that headache usually resolves when overuse is stopped, though not always.

Paul Rizzoli, MD, took issue with that definition. “If you have a lot of headaches and you take medication for them, then you likely have medication overuse headache. They say the most common cause of symptoms suggestive of chronic migraine is medication overuse. That’s like saying, if you have a rash on your arm, then it is an allergic sun exposure rash. No need to characterize the rash,” said Dr. Rizzoli, who is clinical director of the John R. Graham Headache Center at Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital in Boston, during the session.
 

Is medication overuse really the culprit?

Dr. Rizzoli began by emphasizing that taking a lot of medication is always a concern. “Significant hepatic and renal and GI toxicities can result from taking and overusing medication of all sorts. What (I am) questioning is whether or not this rather strange, arbitrary, fluidly-defined concept of abortive migraine medicine overuse is truly responsible for causing all of the ills of which it is accused – and just as importantly, if the proposed solution for it, which is to just stop the overused medication and all will be better – if that solution is the right or wrong advice to give to a patient,” he said.

Much of Dr. Rizzoli’s criticism rested on the definition of medication overuse syndrome. He believes that many concerns about medication overuse can be traced to the use of opiates or barbiturate-containing medications, which have known propensities to lead to headaches. Other cases are less well defined, and “it’s not quite clear what the pathophysiology of the condition is – whether or not it’s the same as rebound or withdrawal headache, or if it is the same as a pronociceptive effect of analgesics, also called medicine-induced headache. Both are well documented and accepted, and the idea of opioid-induced analgesia tolerance is well documented and has several plausible mechanisms attributed to it,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

He said that changes in structural imaging in the brain suggest there at least two subgroups of patients that are both labeled as having medication overuse headache, one from medication overuse and one from progression of migraine disease. “Based on physiology, medication overuse headache cannot be clearly seen as a unitary condition,” he said.

Dr. Rizzoli cited other research on triptans, opioids, and barbiturates that showed an overall conversion from episodic migraine to chronic migraine, with the lowest frequency occurring in patients taking acetaminophen, aspirin, and caffeine (2%), followed by NSAIDs (4%), triptans (4%), opioids (5%), and barbiturates (6%). A total of 52 patients who became chronic were taking triptans, on average 7 days per month. The 1,370 triptan-using patients who remained episodic took triptans on average 5 days per month. “Does this seem like a huge difference between these two groups? The transformation rate in just this triptan subgroup was about 3%-4%, suggesting that, compared with the overall transformation rate of 3%, use of triptans did not exert much force overall on the baseline rate,” he said. Similar patterns were visible with use of other classes of drugs.

Meanwhile, the higher rates of conversion seen with opioids and barbiturates suggests an effect from these drugs. “Perhaps this data suggests the previously known effect is at play here and argues against the need for a separate diagnosis of medication overuse headache,” Dr. Rizzoli said.

“The evidence that simple analgesics can cause medication overuse headache is especially weak, and the evidence that NSAIDs do is conflicting, with some evidence suggesting they’re protective at some doses.” Other population studies suggested most patients with daily headache do not overuse medications, and studies in India, where analgesics are rarely used, still showed a similar rate of conversion to daily headache. Other studies failed to show evidence that withdrawal of overused medication leads to improvement. “Studies of populations after aggressive management of medicine overuse headache indicate that, for the majority of the headaches, for the most part did not clear after treatment, except maybe for a short time,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

A systematic review of 18 population studies showed the prevalence of medical overuse headache ranged from 11% to 68%. “That indicates substantial uncertainty about the magnitude of the problem,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

He also noted potential harms to patients. Many patients come in experience between 10 and 20 headaches per month. “To see them out of medical overuse would have us advising not to treat half of their headaches monthly in order to avoid this evil. Many patients who have read or heard about this condition are themselves restricting treatment so as to avoid medication overuse headache. The harms of such undertreatment have not been fully investigated.”

To get at the issue, he recommended adapting the traditional number-needed-to-treat calculation. “You could calculate a number needed to overtreat. If medication use is assumed to be the sole cause of headache chronification, the calculations could suggest you would need to restrict therapy for about 4 people for each person you protect from going chronic. That’s a lot of undertreatment,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

He summed up by saying that some patients may have a progressive disorder with structure and physiological changes in the brain that result in chronic pain, and such patients should be identified and studied. In others with frequent headache, high medication use may simply be associated with the condition becoming chronic, but not causative. “These diagnostic groups may be mixed and may be difficult to untangle,” said Dr. Rizzoli.
 

Medication overuse is to blame

Dr. Rizzoli’s debate lecture was followed by Barbara Nye, MD, who argued that concerns over medication overuse headache are valid. She noted a more unifying definition in ICHD-3, which requires regular medication overuse for at least 3 months, along with primary headache disorder.

Dr. Nye, who is codirector of the Headache Clinic at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, N.H., related her experience that medication overuse headache often occurs more quickly than the 3-month time frame contained in ICHD-3, especially in patients who were given pain medications after undergoing surgery. She echoed Dr. Rizzoli’s concerns about opiates and barbiturates. “Medicine overuse headache should be something we focus on, and we should be warning providers both in neurology and primary care about the frequent use of opiate and butalbital-containing medications, and frequent over-the-counter medicine use in high-frequency headache disorders,” Dr. Nye said during her talk.

She cited research showing risk factors for conversion from episodic to chronic daily headache. As well as medication overuse, these include White race, lower education status, previous marriage, obesity, diabetes, arthritis, top-quartile caffeine use, stressful life events, and higher headache frequency.

Risks vary by medication class. Opiates and narcotics used more than 2 or 3 times per week are of particular concern, as are short-acting over-the-counter medicines used more than three times per week or 10-15 days per month. She agreed that NSAIDs may have a protective effect, but only at much lower doses and when used about five (or fewer) times per month. One study showed a possible protection effect of NSAIDs, though when used more than 10 days/month, they were associated with medication overuse headache.

Fioricet and Fiorinal, used more than 1 day/week, have an early and robust medicine overuse effect. “Limiting that use is very important,” said Dr. Nye. Other medicines and doses of concern include Tramadol/Ultram used at a higher than 50 mg/day dose, which has a metabolite that causes headache, and triptans used more than 10 days/month.

These concerns came about after analysis of large trials in patients with other conditions who also suffer from episodic migraines. A study of patients with irritable bowel syndrome and migraine showed a risk of conversion with opioid treatment. Another study of patients with arthritis and episodic migraine showed an association between conversion and NSAIDs alone, NSAIDs combined with Tylenol, and NSAIDs combined with opioids.

Risks of medication overuse also included collateral damage to the gastrointestinal and kidney systems, development of dependence, exacerbation of depression, and opioid-induced hyperalgesia, according to Dr. Nye. The overused medication may also interfere with the use of preventive medication. Those concerns drive the conventional wisdom of weaning patients off the overused medication, Dr. Nye said.

Dr. Nye discussed some of the observations of structural changes in the brain found in episodic migraine and chronic migraine associated with medication overuse. Functional MRI showed changes in grey matter, both as a result of medication overuse headache and further changes after medication withdrawal. “A lot of neuroplasticity and neuroadaptation occurs, and these effects seem to be sustained anywhere from 4-6 months after (medicine) discontinuation,” said Dr. Nye.
 

Common ground

Dr. Nye emphasized the need to be aware of the dangers of medication overuse headache, but noted that clinicians should address the problem to ensure that patients are empowered, potentially providing preventive medications and encouraging more effective use of daily abortive medications.

In response, Dr. Rizzoli suggested that the two agreed on many issues. For her part, Dr. Nye agreed that medication overuse headache is a muddy concept that needs more research to understand the relationship between opiate use and chronic migraine, “but I do think there have been some good studies of fMRI evaluating the difference between those with medication overuse headache and seeing how they convert back to a different underlying network (following medication withdrawal). I do agree that there is probably a subpopulation that is not affected by medication overuse headache,” Dr. Nye said.

In the end, both expressed concerns for the patient. “I share Barbara’s concern that we need to be mindful and protect our patients from medication use, but on the other hand I think we also need to protect our patients from the complications of having a diagnosis of medical overuse and the stigmatization that goes with that. That particular issue goes both ways,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

“I absolutely agree with that,” responded Dr. Nye.

Dr. Nye is on the advisory boards for Biohaven, Upsher Smith, and Impel. She is a trial site principal investigator for Allergan, Amgen, and Satsuma. Dr. Rizzoli has been a consultant for Nestle and served on the scientific advisory or data safety monitoring board for Biohaven and Xoc Pharma. He has also received research support from Allergan.

Medication overuse headache presents difficult challenges for both patients and physicians. Physicians worry about episodic migraine converting to chronic daily headache, but this worry can also lead to under-treatment and even stigmatization of patients who aggressively treat their symptoms.

These concerns and others were a topic of a debate at the Headache Cooperative of New England’s 20th Annual HCNE Boston Fall Headache Symposium, which was conducted virtually.

The International Classification of Headache-3 (ICHD-3) defines medication overuse headache as a headache that occurs on 15 or more days per month in a patient with pre-existing primary headache, and that develops because of regular overuse of acute or symptomatic headache medication. The ICHD-3 also says that headache usually resolves when overuse is stopped, though not always.

Paul Rizzoli, MD, took issue with that definition. “If you have a lot of headaches and you take medication for them, then you likely have medication overuse headache. They say the most common cause of symptoms suggestive of chronic migraine is medication overuse. That’s like saying, if you have a rash on your arm, then it is an allergic sun exposure rash. No need to characterize the rash,” said Dr. Rizzoli, who is clinical director of the John R. Graham Headache Center at Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital in Boston, during the session.
 

Is medication overuse really the culprit?

Dr. Rizzoli began by emphasizing that taking a lot of medication is always a concern. “Significant hepatic and renal and GI toxicities can result from taking and overusing medication of all sorts. What (I am) questioning is whether or not this rather strange, arbitrary, fluidly-defined concept of abortive migraine medicine overuse is truly responsible for causing all of the ills of which it is accused – and just as importantly, if the proposed solution for it, which is to just stop the overused medication and all will be better – if that solution is the right or wrong advice to give to a patient,” he said.

Much of Dr. Rizzoli’s criticism rested on the definition of medication overuse syndrome. He believes that many concerns about medication overuse can be traced to the use of opiates or barbiturate-containing medications, which have known propensities to lead to headaches. Other cases are less well defined, and “it’s not quite clear what the pathophysiology of the condition is – whether or not it’s the same as rebound or withdrawal headache, or if it is the same as a pronociceptive effect of analgesics, also called medicine-induced headache. Both are well documented and accepted, and the idea of opioid-induced analgesia tolerance is well documented and has several plausible mechanisms attributed to it,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

He said that changes in structural imaging in the brain suggest there at least two subgroups of patients that are both labeled as having medication overuse headache, one from medication overuse and one from progression of migraine disease. “Based on physiology, medication overuse headache cannot be clearly seen as a unitary condition,” he said.

Dr. Rizzoli cited other research on triptans, opioids, and barbiturates that showed an overall conversion from episodic migraine to chronic migraine, with the lowest frequency occurring in patients taking acetaminophen, aspirin, and caffeine (2%), followed by NSAIDs (4%), triptans (4%), opioids (5%), and barbiturates (6%). A total of 52 patients who became chronic were taking triptans, on average 7 days per month. The 1,370 triptan-using patients who remained episodic took triptans on average 5 days per month. “Does this seem like a huge difference between these two groups? The transformation rate in just this triptan subgroup was about 3%-4%, suggesting that, compared with the overall transformation rate of 3%, use of triptans did not exert much force overall on the baseline rate,” he said. Similar patterns were visible with use of other classes of drugs.

Meanwhile, the higher rates of conversion seen with opioids and barbiturates suggests an effect from these drugs. “Perhaps this data suggests the previously known effect is at play here and argues against the need for a separate diagnosis of medication overuse headache,” Dr. Rizzoli said.

“The evidence that simple analgesics can cause medication overuse headache is especially weak, and the evidence that NSAIDs do is conflicting, with some evidence suggesting they’re protective at some doses.” Other population studies suggested most patients with daily headache do not overuse medications, and studies in India, where analgesics are rarely used, still showed a similar rate of conversion to daily headache. Other studies failed to show evidence that withdrawal of overused medication leads to improvement. “Studies of populations after aggressive management of medicine overuse headache indicate that, for the majority of the headaches, for the most part did not clear after treatment, except maybe for a short time,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

A systematic review of 18 population studies showed the prevalence of medical overuse headache ranged from 11% to 68%. “That indicates substantial uncertainty about the magnitude of the problem,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

He also noted potential harms to patients. Many patients come in experience between 10 and 20 headaches per month. “To see them out of medical overuse would have us advising not to treat half of their headaches monthly in order to avoid this evil. Many patients who have read or heard about this condition are themselves restricting treatment so as to avoid medication overuse headache. The harms of such undertreatment have not been fully investigated.”

To get at the issue, he recommended adapting the traditional number-needed-to-treat calculation. “You could calculate a number needed to overtreat. If medication use is assumed to be the sole cause of headache chronification, the calculations could suggest you would need to restrict therapy for about 4 people for each person you protect from going chronic. That’s a lot of undertreatment,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

He summed up by saying that some patients may have a progressive disorder with structure and physiological changes in the brain that result in chronic pain, and such patients should be identified and studied. In others with frequent headache, high medication use may simply be associated with the condition becoming chronic, but not causative. “These diagnostic groups may be mixed and may be difficult to untangle,” said Dr. Rizzoli.
 

Medication overuse is to blame

Dr. Rizzoli’s debate lecture was followed by Barbara Nye, MD, who argued that concerns over medication overuse headache are valid. She noted a more unifying definition in ICHD-3, which requires regular medication overuse for at least 3 months, along with primary headache disorder.

Dr. Nye, who is codirector of the Headache Clinic at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, N.H., related her experience that medication overuse headache often occurs more quickly than the 3-month time frame contained in ICHD-3, especially in patients who were given pain medications after undergoing surgery. She echoed Dr. Rizzoli’s concerns about opiates and barbiturates. “Medicine overuse headache should be something we focus on, and we should be warning providers both in neurology and primary care about the frequent use of opiate and butalbital-containing medications, and frequent over-the-counter medicine use in high-frequency headache disorders,” Dr. Nye said during her talk.

She cited research showing risk factors for conversion from episodic to chronic daily headache. As well as medication overuse, these include White race, lower education status, previous marriage, obesity, diabetes, arthritis, top-quartile caffeine use, stressful life events, and higher headache frequency.

Risks vary by medication class. Opiates and narcotics used more than 2 or 3 times per week are of particular concern, as are short-acting over-the-counter medicines used more than three times per week or 10-15 days per month. She agreed that NSAIDs may have a protective effect, but only at much lower doses and when used about five (or fewer) times per month. One study showed a possible protection effect of NSAIDs, though when used more than 10 days/month, they were associated with medication overuse headache.

Fioricet and Fiorinal, used more than 1 day/week, have an early and robust medicine overuse effect. “Limiting that use is very important,” said Dr. Nye. Other medicines and doses of concern include Tramadol/Ultram used at a higher than 50 mg/day dose, which has a metabolite that causes headache, and triptans used more than 10 days/month.

These concerns came about after analysis of large trials in patients with other conditions who also suffer from episodic migraines. A study of patients with irritable bowel syndrome and migraine showed a risk of conversion with opioid treatment. Another study of patients with arthritis and episodic migraine showed an association between conversion and NSAIDs alone, NSAIDs combined with Tylenol, and NSAIDs combined with opioids.

Risks of medication overuse also included collateral damage to the gastrointestinal and kidney systems, development of dependence, exacerbation of depression, and opioid-induced hyperalgesia, according to Dr. Nye. The overused medication may also interfere with the use of preventive medication. Those concerns drive the conventional wisdom of weaning patients off the overused medication, Dr. Nye said.

Dr. Nye discussed some of the observations of structural changes in the brain found in episodic migraine and chronic migraine associated with medication overuse. Functional MRI showed changes in grey matter, both as a result of medication overuse headache and further changes after medication withdrawal. “A lot of neuroplasticity and neuroadaptation occurs, and these effects seem to be sustained anywhere from 4-6 months after (medicine) discontinuation,” said Dr. Nye.
 

Common ground

Dr. Nye emphasized the need to be aware of the dangers of medication overuse headache, but noted that clinicians should address the problem to ensure that patients are empowered, potentially providing preventive medications and encouraging more effective use of daily abortive medications.

In response, Dr. Rizzoli suggested that the two agreed on many issues. For her part, Dr. Nye agreed that medication overuse headache is a muddy concept that needs more research to understand the relationship between opiate use and chronic migraine, “but I do think there have been some good studies of fMRI evaluating the difference between those with medication overuse headache and seeing how they convert back to a different underlying network (following medication withdrawal). I do agree that there is probably a subpopulation that is not affected by medication overuse headache,” Dr. Nye said.

In the end, both expressed concerns for the patient. “I share Barbara’s concern that we need to be mindful and protect our patients from medication use, but on the other hand I think we also need to protect our patients from the complications of having a diagnosis of medical overuse and the stigmatization that goes with that. That particular issue goes both ways,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

“I absolutely agree with that,” responded Dr. Nye.

Dr. Nye is on the advisory boards for Biohaven, Upsher Smith, and Impel. She is a trial site principal investigator for Allergan, Amgen, and Satsuma. Dr. Rizzoli has been a consultant for Nestle and served on the scientific advisory or data safety monitoring board for Biohaven and Xoc Pharma. He has also received research support from Allergan.

Medication overuse headache presents difficult challenges for both patients and physicians. Physicians worry about episodic migraine converting to chronic daily headache, but this worry can also lead to under-treatment and even stigmatization of patients who aggressively treat their symptoms.

These concerns and others were a topic of a debate at the Headache Cooperative of New England’s 20th Annual HCNE Boston Fall Headache Symposium, which was conducted virtually.

The International Classification of Headache-3 (ICHD-3) defines medication overuse headache as a headache that occurs on 15 or more days per month in a patient with pre-existing primary headache, and that develops because of regular overuse of acute or symptomatic headache medication. The ICHD-3 also says that headache usually resolves when overuse is stopped, though not always.

Paul Rizzoli, MD, took issue with that definition. “If you have a lot of headaches and you take medication for them, then you likely have medication overuse headache. They say the most common cause of symptoms suggestive of chronic migraine is medication overuse. That’s like saying, if you have a rash on your arm, then it is an allergic sun exposure rash. No need to characterize the rash,” said Dr. Rizzoli, who is clinical director of the John R. Graham Headache Center at Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital in Boston, during the session.
 

Is medication overuse really the culprit?

Dr. Rizzoli began by emphasizing that taking a lot of medication is always a concern. “Significant hepatic and renal and GI toxicities can result from taking and overusing medication of all sorts. What (I am) questioning is whether or not this rather strange, arbitrary, fluidly-defined concept of abortive migraine medicine overuse is truly responsible for causing all of the ills of which it is accused – and just as importantly, if the proposed solution for it, which is to just stop the overused medication and all will be better – if that solution is the right or wrong advice to give to a patient,” he said.

Much of Dr. Rizzoli’s criticism rested on the definition of medication overuse syndrome. He believes that many concerns about medication overuse can be traced to the use of opiates or barbiturate-containing medications, which have known propensities to lead to headaches. Other cases are less well defined, and “it’s not quite clear what the pathophysiology of the condition is – whether or not it’s the same as rebound or withdrawal headache, or if it is the same as a pronociceptive effect of analgesics, also called medicine-induced headache. Both are well documented and accepted, and the idea of opioid-induced analgesia tolerance is well documented and has several plausible mechanisms attributed to it,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

He said that changes in structural imaging in the brain suggest there at least two subgroups of patients that are both labeled as having medication overuse headache, one from medication overuse and one from progression of migraine disease. “Based on physiology, medication overuse headache cannot be clearly seen as a unitary condition,” he said.

Dr. Rizzoli cited other research on triptans, opioids, and barbiturates that showed an overall conversion from episodic migraine to chronic migraine, with the lowest frequency occurring in patients taking acetaminophen, aspirin, and caffeine (2%), followed by NSAIDs (4%), triptans (4%), opioids (5%), and barbiturates (6%). A total of 52 patients who became chronic were taking triptans, on average 7 days per month. The 1,370 triptan-using patients who remained episodic took triptans on average 5 days per month. “Does this seem like a huge difference between these two groups? The transformation rate in just this triptan subgroup was about 3%-4%, suggesting that, compared with the overall transformation rate of 3%, use of triptans did not exert much force overall on the baseline rate,” he said. Similar patterns were visible with use of other classes of drugs.

Meanwhile, the higher rates of conversion seen with opioids and barbiturates suggests an effect from these drugs. “Perhaps this data suggests the previously known effect is at play here and argues against the need for a separate diagnosis of medication overuse headache,” Dr. Rizzoli said.

“The evidence that simple analgesics can cause medication overuse headache is especially weak, and the evidence that NSAIDs do is conflicting, with some evidence suggesting they’re protective at some doses.” Other population studies suggested most patients with daily headache do not overuse medications, and studies in India, where analgesics are rarely used, still showed a similar rate of conversion to daily headache. Other studies failed to show evidence that withdrawal of overused medication leads to improvement. “Studies of populations after aggressive management of medicine overuse headache indicate that, for the majority of the headaches, for the most part did not clear after treatment, except maybe for a short time,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

A systematic review of 18 population studies showed the prevalence of medical overuse headache ranged from 11% to 68%. “That indicates substantial uncertainty about the magnitude of the problem,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

He also noted potential harms to patients. Many patients come in experience between 10 and 20 headaches per month. “To see them out of medical overuse would have us advising not to treat half of their headaches monthly in order to avoid this evil. Many patients who have read or heard about this condition are themselves restricting treatment so as to avoid medication overuse headache. The harms of such undertreatment have not been fully investigated.”

To get at the issue, he recommended adapting the traditional number-needed-to-treat calculation. “You could calculate a number needed to overtreat. If medication use is assumed to be the sole cause of headache chronification, the calculations could suggest you would need to restrict therapy for about 4 people for each person you protect from going chronic. That’s a lot of undertreatment,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

He summed up by saying that some patients may have a progressive disorder with structure and physiological changes in the brain that result in chronic pain, and such patients should be identified and studied. In others with frequent headache, high medication use may simply be associated with the condition becoming chronic, but not causative. “These diagnostic groups may be mixed and may be difficult to untangle,” said Dr. Rizzoli.
 

Medication overuse is to blame

Dr. Rizzoli’s debate lecture was followed by Barbara Nye, MD, who argued that concerns over medication overuse headache are valid. She noted a more unifying definition in ICHD-3, which requires regular medication overuse for at least 3 months, along with primary headache disorder.

Dr. Nye, who is codirector of the Headache Clinic at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, N.H., related her experience that medication overuse headache often occurs more quickly than the 3-month time frame contained in ICHD-3, especially in patients who were given pain medications after undergoing surgery. She echoed Dr. Rizzoli’s concerns about opiates and barbiturates. “Medicine overuse headache should be something we focus on, and we should be warning providers both in neurology and primary care about the frequent use of opiate and butalbital-containing medications, and frequent over-the-counter medicine use in high-frequency headache disorders,” Dr. Nye said during her talk.

She cited research showing risk factors for conversion from episodic to chronic daily headache. As well as medication overuse, these include White race, lower education status, previous marriage, obesity, diabetes, arthritis, top-quartile caffeine use, stressful life events, and higher headache frequency.

Risks vary by medication class. Opiates and narcotics used more than 2 or 3 times per week are of particular concern, as are short-acting over-the-counter medicines used more than three times per week or 10-15 days per month. She agreed that NSAIDs may have a protective effect, but only at much lower doses and when used about five (or fewer) times per month. One study showed a possible protection effect of NSAIDs, though when used more than 10 days/month, they were associated with medication overuse headache.

Fioricet and Fiorinal, used more than 1 day/week, have an early and robust medicine overuse effect. “Limiting that use is very important,” said Dr. Nye. Other medicines and doses of concern include Tramadol/Ultram used at a higher than 50 mg/day dose, which has a metabolite that causes headache, and triptans used more than 10 days/month.

These concerns came about after analysis of large trials in patients with other conditions who also suffer from episodic migraines. A study of patients with irritable bowel syndrome and migraine showed a risk of conversion with opioid treatment. Another study of patients with arthritis and episodic migraine showed an association between conversion and NSAIDs alone, NSAIDs combined with Tylenol, and NSAIDs combined with opioids.

Risks of medication overuse also included collateral damage to the gastrointestinal and kidney systems, development of dependence, exacerbation of depression, and opioid-induced hyperalgesia, according to Dr. Nye. The overused medication may also interfere with the use of preventive medication. Those concerns drive the conventional wisdom of weaning patients off the overused medication, Dr. Nye said.

Dr. Nye discussed some of the observations of structural changes in the brain found in episodic migraine and chronic migraine associated with medication overuse. Functional MRI showed changes in grey matter, both as a result of medication overuse headache and further changes after medication withdrawal. “A lot of neuroplasticity and neuroadaptation occurs, and these effects seem to be sustained anywhere from 4-6 months after (medicine) discontinuation,” said Dr. Nye.
 

Common ground

Dr. Nye emphasized the need to be aware of the dangers of medication overuse headache, but noted that clinicians should address the problem to ensure that patients are empowered, potentially providing preventive medications and encouraging more effective use of daily abortive medications.

In response, Dr. Rizzoli suggested that the two agreed on many issues. For her part, Dr. Nye agreed that medication overuse headache is a muddy concept that needs more research to understand the relationship between opiate use and chronic migraine, “but I do think there have been some good studies of fMRI evaluating the difference between those with medication overuse headache and seeing how they convert back to a different underlying network (following medication withdrawal). I do agree that there is probably a subpopulation that is not affected by medication overuse headache,” Dr. Nye said.

In the end, both expressed concerns for the patient. “I share Barbara’s concern that we need to be mindful and protect our patients from medication use, but on the other hand I think we also need to protect our patients from the complications of having a diagnosis of medical overuse and the stigmatization that goes with that. That particular issue goes both ways,” said Dr. Rizzoli.

“I absolutely agree with that,” responded Dr. Nye.

Dr. Nye is on the advisory boards for Biohaven, Upsher Smith, and Impel. She is a trial site principal investigator for Allergan, Amgen, and Satsuma. Dr. Rizzoli has been a consultant for Nestle and served on the scientific advisory or data safety monitoring board for Biohaven and Xoc Pharma. He has also received research support from Allergan.

Studies that address fundamental questions in hepatology and have the potential to change or improve clinical practice were the focus of a clinical debrief session from the virtual annual meeting of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases.

“We chose papers that had the highest level of evidence, such as randomized controlled trials, controlled studies, and large data sets – and some small data sets too,” said Tamar Taddei, MD, associate professor of medicine in the section of digestive disease at Yale University, New Haven, Conn.

Dr. Taddei and colleagues Silvia Vilarinho, MD, PhD; Simona Jakab, MD; and Ariel Jaffe, MD, all also from Yale, selected the papers from among 197 oral and 1,769 poster abstracts presented at AASLD 2020.

They highlighted the most important findings from presentations on autoimmune and cholestatic disease, transplantation, cirrhosis and portal hypertension, alcoholic liver disease, neoplasia, drug-induced liver injury, and COVID-19. They did not review studies focused primarily on nonalcoholic steatohepatitis or nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, viral hepatitis, or basic science, all of which were covered in separate debriefing sessions.
 

Cirrhosis and portal hypertension

A study from the Department of Veterans Affairs looked at the prevalence of liver disease risk factors and rates of subsequent testing for and diagnosis of cirrhosis in the Veterans Health Administration system (VHA).

The authors found that, among more than 6.65 million VHA users in 2018 with no prior diagnosis of cirrhosis, approximately half were at risk for cirrhosis, of whom about 75% were screened, and approximately 5% of those who were screened were positive for possible cirrhosis (133,636). Of the patients who screened positive, about 10% (12,566) received a diagnosis of cirrhosis, including 4,120 with liver decompensation.

“This paper underscores the importance of population-level screening in uncovering unrecognized cirrhosis, enabling intervention earlier in the course of disease,” Dr. Taddei said (Abstract #661).

A study looking at external validation of novel cirrhosis surgical risk models designed to improve prognostication for a range of common surgeries showed that the VOCAL-Penn score was superior to the Mayo Risk Score, Model for End-stage Liver Disease and MELD-sodium scores for discrimination of 30-day and 90-day postoperative mortality (Abstract #91).

“While these models are not a substitute for clinical acumen, they certainly improve our surgical risk prediction in patients with cirrhosis, a very common question in consultative hepatology,” Dr. Taddei said.

She also cited three abstracts that address the important questions regarding performing studies in patients with varices or ascites, including whether it’s safe to perform transesophageal echocardiography in patients with cirrhosis without first screening for varices, and whether nonselective beta-blockers should be continued in patients with refractory ascites.

A retrospective study of 191 patients with cirrhosis who underwent upper endoscopy within 4 years of transesophageal echocardiography had no overt gastrointestinal bleeding regardless of the presence of esophageal varices, suggesting that routine preprocedure esophagogastroduodenoscopy “is of no utility,” (Abstract #1872).

A study to determine risk of sepsis in 1,198 patients with cirrhosis found that 1-year risk of sepsis was reduced by 50% with the use of nonselective beta-blockers (Abstract #94).

The final abstract in this category touched on the use of an advance care planning video support tool to help transplant-ineligible patients with end-stage liver disease decide whether they want support measures such cardiopulmonary resuscitation or intubation. The authors found that the video decision tool was feasible and acceptable to patients, and improved their knowledge of end-of-life care. More patients randomized to the video arm opted against CPR or intubation, compared with those assigned to a verbal discussion of options (Abstract #712).
 

Alcohol

The reviewers highlighted two studies of alcohol use: The first was designed to determine the prevalence of early alcohol relapse (resumption within 3 months) in patients who presented with alcoholic hepatitis. The subjects included 478 patients enrolled in the STOPAH trial, and a validation set of 194 patients from the InTeam (Integrated Approaches for identifying Molecular Targets in Alcoholic Hepatitis) Consortium.

“They found that high-risk patients were younger, unemployed, and without a stable relationship. Intermediate risk were middle aged, employed, and in a stable relationship, and low-risk profiles were older, with known cirrhosis; they were mostly retired and in a stable relationship,” Dr. Taddei said.

The identification of nongenetic factors that predict early relapse may aid in personalization of treatment strategies, she said (Abstract #232).

The second study looked at fecal microbial transplant (FMT) for reducing cravings in adults with alcohol use disorder (AUD) and cirrhosis. The investigators saw a nonsignificant trend toward greater total abstinence at 6 months in patients randomized to FMT versus placebo.

“Future trials should be performed to determine the impact of FMT on altering the gut-brain axis in patients with AUD,” she said (Abstract #7).
 

Transplantation

The prospective controlled QUICKTRANS study by French and Belgian researchers found that patients who underwent early liver transplantation for severe alcoholic hepatitis had numerically but not significantly higher rates of relapse than patients who were transplanted after at least 6 months of abstinence, although heavy drinking was more frequent in patients who underwent early transplant.

The 2-year survival rates for both patients who underwent early transplant and those who underwent transplant after 6 months of sobriety were “identical, and excellent.” In addition, the 2-year survival rate for patients with severe alcoholic hepatitis who underwent transplant was 82.8%, compared with 28.2% for patients who were deemed ineligible for transplant according to a selection algorithm (P­ < .001).

“Perhaps most important is that studies in this population can be conducted in a controlled fashion across centers with reproducible transplant eligibility algorithms,” Dr. Taddei commented (Abstract #6).

The place of honor – Abstract # 1 – was reserved for a study looking at the effects on liver transplant practice of a new “safety net” policy from the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network and United Network for Organ Sharing stating that patients awaiting liver transplantation who develop kidney failure may be given priority on the kidney transplant waiting list.

The investigators found that the new policy significantly increased the number of adult primary liver transplant alone candidates who where on dialysis at the time of listing, and did not affect either waiting list mortality or posttransplant outcomes.

The authors also saw a significant increase in kidney transplant listing after liver transplant, especially for patients who were on hemodialysis at the time of list.

In the period after implementation of the policy, there was a significantly higher probability of kidney transplant, and significant reduction in waiting list mortality.
 

Autoimmune & cholestatic diseases

Investigators performed an analysis of the phase 3 randomized controlled ENHANCE trial of seladelpar in patients with primary biliary cholangitis. The trial was stopped because of an adverse event ultimately deemed to be unrelated to the drug, so the analysis looked at the composite responder rate at month 3.

“The key takeaway from this study is that at the 10-mg dosage of seladelpar, 78% met a composite endpoint, 27% of patients normalized their alkaline phosphatase, and 50% normalized their ALT. There was significant improvement in pruritus,” Dr. Taddei said.

The drug was generally safe and well tolerated. A 52-week phase 3 global registration study will begin enrolling patients in early 2021 (Abstract #LO11).

In a pediatric study, investigators looked at differences in primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC) among various population, and found that “Black and Hispanic patients have dramatically worse clinical outcomes, compared to White and Asian patients. They are more likely to be diagnosed with PSC at an advanced stage with extensive fibrosis and portal hypertensive manifestations.”

The authors suggested that the differences may be explained in part by socioeconomic disparities leading to delay in diagnosis, to a more aggressive phenotype, or both (Abstract #66).

A meta-analysis of maternal and fetal outcomes in women with autoimmune hepatitis showed that the disease is associated with increased risk of gestational diabetes, premature births, and small-for-gestational age or low-birth-weight babies.

“Pregnant women should be monitored closely before, during and after pregnancy. It’s important to know that, in the prevalence data, flares were most prevalent postpartum at 41%. These finds will help us counsel our patients with autoimmune hepatitis who become pregnant,” Dr. Taddei said (Abstract #97).
 

Drug-induced liver injury

A study of clinical outcomes following immune checkpoint inhibitor rechallenge in melanoma patients with resolved higher grade 3 or higher checkpoint inhibitor–induced hepatitis showed that 4 of 31 patients (13%) developed recurrence of grade 2 or greater hepatitis, and 15 of 31 (48%) developed an immune-related adverse event after rechallenge.

There was no difference in time to death between patients who were rechallenged and those who were not, and immune-related liver toxicities requiring drug discontinuation after rechallenge were uncommon.

“High-grade immune checkpoint inhibitor hepatitis should be reconsidered as an absolute contraindication for immune checkpoint inhibitor rechallenge,” Dr. Taddei said (Abstract # 116).
 

Neoplasia

The investigators also highlighted an abstract describing significant urban-rural and racial ethnic differences in hepatocellular carcinoma rates. A fuller description of this study can be found here (Abstract #136).

COVID-19

Finally, the reviewer highlighted a study of the clinical course of COVID-19 in patients with chronic liver disease, and to determine factors associated with adverse outcomes in patients with chronic liver disease who acquire COVID-19.

The investigators found that patients with chronic liver disease and COVID-19 have a 14% morality rate, and that alcohol-related liver disease, decompensated cirrhosis, and hepatocellular carcinoma are all risk factors for increased mortality from COVID-19.

They recommended emphasizing telemedicine, prioritizing patients with chronic liver disease for vaccination, and including these patients in prospective studies and drug trials for COVID-19 therapies.

Dr. Taddei reported having no disclosures.

Studies that address fundamental questions in hepatology and have the potential to change or improve clinical practice were the focus of a clinical debrief session from the virtual annual meeting of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases.

“We chose papers that had the highest level of evidence, such as randomized controlled trials, controlled studies, and large data sets – and some small data sets too,” said Tamar Taddei, MD, associate professor of medicine in the section of digestive disease at Yale University, New Haven, Conn.

Dr. Taddei and colleagues Silvia Vilarinho, MD, PhD; Simona Jakab, MD; and Ariel Jaffe, MD, all also from Yale, selected the papers from among 197 oral and 1,769 poster abstracts presented at AASLD 2020.

They highlighted the most important findings from presentations on autoimmune and cholestatic disease, transplantation, cirrhosis and portal hypertension, alcoholic liver disease, neoplasia, drug-induced liver injury, and COVID-19. They did not review studies focused primarily on nonalcoholic steatohepatitis or nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, viral hepatitis, or basic science, all of which were covered in separate debriefing sessions.
 

Cirrhosis and portal hypertension

A study from the Department of Veterans Affairs looked at the prevalence of liver disease risk factors and rates of subsequent testing for and diagnosis of cirrhosis in the Veterans Health Administration system (VHA).

The authors found that, among more than 6.65 million VHA users in 2018 with no prior diagnosis of cirrhosis, approximately half were at risk for cirrhosis, of whom about 75% were screened, and approximately 5% of those who were screened were positive for possible cirrhosis (133,636). Of the patients who screened positive, about 10% (12,566) received a diagnosis of cirrhosis, including 4,120 with liver decompensation.

“This paper underscores the importance of population-level screening in uncovering unrecognized cirrhosis, enabling intervention earlier in the course of disease,” Dr. Taddei said (Abstract #661).

A study looking at external validation of novel cirrhosis surgical risk models designed to improve prognostication for a range of common surgeries showed that the VOCAL-Penn score was superior to the Mayo Risk Score, Model for End-stage Liver Disease and MELD-sodium scores for discrimination of 30-day and 90-day postoperative mortality (Abstract #91).

“While these models are not a substitute for clinical acumen, they certainly improve our surgical risk prediction in patients with cirrhosis, a very common question in consultative hepatology,” Dr. Taddei said.

She also cited three abstracts that address the important questions regarding performing studies in patients with varices or ascites, including whether it’s safe to perform transesophageal echocardiography in patients with cirrhosis without first screening for varices, and whether nonselective beta-blockers should be continued in patients with refractory ascites.

A retrospective study of 191 patients with cirrhosis who underwent upper endoscopy within 4 years of transesophageal echocardiography had no overt gastrointestinal bleeding regardless of the presence of esophageal varices, suggesting that routine preprocedure esophagogastroduodenoscopy “is of no utility,” (Abstract #1872).

A study to determine risk of sepsis in 1,198 patients with cirrhosis found that 1-year risk of sepsis was reduced by 50% with the use of nonselective beta-blockers (Abstract #94).

The final abstract in this category touched on the use of an advance care planning video support tool to help transplant-ineligible patients with end-stage liver disease decide whether they want support measures such cardiopulmonary resuscitation or intubation. The authors found that the video decision tool was feasible and acceptable to patients, and improved their knowledge of end-of-life care. More patients randomized to the video arm opted against CPR or intubation, compared with those assigned to a verbal discussion of options (Abstract #712).
 

Alcohol

The reviewers highlighted two studies of alcohol use: The first was designed to determine the prevalence of early alcohol relapse (resumption within 3 months) in patients who presented with alcoholic hepatitis. The subjects included 478 patients enrolled in the STOPAH trial, and a validation set of 194 patients from the InTeam (Integrated Approaches for identifying Molecular Targets in Alcoholic Hepatitis) Consortium.

“They found that high-risk patients were younger, unemployed, and without a stable relationship. Intermediate risk were middle aged, employed, and in a stable relationship, and low-risk profiles were older, with known cirrhosis; they were mostly retired and in a stable relationship,” Dr. Taddei said.

The identification of nongenetic factors that predict early relapse may aid in personalization of treatment strategies, she said (Abstract #232).

The second study looked at fecal microbial transplant (FMT) for reducing cravings in adults with alcohol use disorder (AUD) and cirrhosis. The investigators saw a nonsignificant trend toward greater total abstinence at 6 months in patients randomized to FMT versus placebo.

“Future trials should be performed to determine the impact of FMT on altering the gut-brain axis in patients with AUD,” she said (Abstract #7).
 

Transplantation

The prospective controlled QUICKTRANS study by French and Belgian researchers found that patients who underwent early liver transplantation for severe alcoholic hepatitis had numerically but not significantly higher rates of relapse than patients who were transplanted after at least 6 months of abstinence, although heavy drinking was more frequent in patients who underwent early transplant.

The 2-year survival rates for both patients who underwent early transplant and those who underwent transplant after 6 months of sobriety were “identical, and excellent.” In addition, the 2-year survival rate for patients with severe alcoholic hepatitis who underwent transplant was 82.8%, compared with 28.2% for patients who were deemed ineligible for transplant according to a selection algorithm (P­ < .001).

“Perhaps most important is that studies in this population can be conducted in a controlled fashion across centers with reproducible transplant eligibility algorithms,” Dr. Taddei commented (Abstract #6).

The place of honor – Abstract # 1 – was reserved for a study looking at the effects on liver transplant practice of a new “safety net” policy from the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network and United Network for Organ Sharing stating that patients awaiting liver transplantation who develop kidney failure may be given priority on the kidney transplant waiting list.

The investigators found that the new policy significantly increased the number of adult primary liver transplant alone candidates who where on dialysis at the time of listing, and did not affect either waiting list mortality or posttransplant outcomes.

The authors also saw a significant increase in kidney transplant listing after liver transplant, especially for patients who were on hemodialysis at the time of list.

In the period after implementation of the policy, there was a significantly higher probability of kidney transplant, and significant reduction in waiting list mortality.
 

Autoimmune & cholestatic diseases

Investigators performed an analysis of the phase 3 randomized controlled ENHANCE trial of seladelpar in patients with primary biliary cholangitis. The trial was stopped because of an adverse event ultimately deemed to be unrelated to the drug, so the analysis looked at the composite responder rate at month 3.

“The key takeaway from this study is that at the 10-mg dosage of seladelpar, 78% met a composite endpoint, 27% of patients normalized their alkaline phosphatase, and 50% normalized their ALT. There was significant improvement in pruritus,” Dr. Taddei said.

The drug was generally safe and well tolerated. A 52-week phase 3 global registration study will begin enrolling patients in early 2021 (Abstract #LO11).

In a pediatric study, investigators looked at differences in primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC) among various population, and found that “Black and Hispanic patients have dramatically worse clinical outcomes, compared to White and Asian patients. They are more likely to be diagnosed with PSC at an advanced stage with extensive fibrosis and portal hypertensive manifestations.”

The authors suggested that the differences may be explained in part by socioeconomic disparities leading to delay in diagnosis, to a more aggressive phenotype, or both (Abstract #66).

A meta-analysis of maternal and fetal outcomes in women with autoimmune hepatitis showed that the disease is associated with increased risk of gestational diabetes, premature births, and small-for-gestational age or low-birth-weight babies.

“Pregnant women should be monitored closely before, during and after pregnancy. It’s important to know that, in the prevalence data, flares were most prevalent postpartum at 41%. These finds will help us counsel our patients with autoimmune hepatitis who become pregnant,” Dr. Taddei said (Abstract #97).
 

Drug-induced liver injury

A study of clinical outcomes following immune checkpoint inhibitor rechallenge in melanoma patients with resolved higher grade 3 or higher checkpoint inhibitor–induced hepatitis showed that 4 of 31 patients (13%) developed recurrence of grade 2 or greater hepatitis, and 15 of 31 (48%) developed an immune-related adverse event after rechallenge.

There was no difference in time to death between patients who were rechallenged and those who were not, and immune-related liver toxicities requiring drug discontinuation after rechallenge were uncommon.

“High-grade immune checkpoint inhibitor hepatitis should be reconsidered as an absolute contraindication for immune checkpoint inhibitor rechallenge,” Dr. Taddei said (Abstract # 116).
 

Neoplasia

The investigators also highlighted an abstract describing significant urban-rural and racial ethnic differences in hepatocellular carcinoma rates. A fuller description of this study can be found here (Abstract #136).

COVID-19

Finally, the reviewer highlighted a study of the clinical course of COVID-19 in patients with chronic liver disease, and to determine factors associated with adverse outcomes in patients with chronic liver disease who acquire COVID-19.

The investigators found that patients with chronic liver disease and COVID-19 have a 14% morality rate, and that alcohol-related liver disease, decompensated cirrhosis, and hepatocellular carcinoma are all risk factors for increased mortality from COVID-19.

They recommended emphasizing telemedicine, prioritizing patients with chronic liver disease for vaccination, and including these patients in prospective studies and drug trials for COVID-19 therapies.

Dr. Taddei reported having no disclosures.

Studies that address fundamental questions in hepatology and have the potential to change or improve clinical practice were the focus of a clinical debrief session from the virtual annual meeting of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases.

“We chose papers that had the highest level of evidence, such as randomized controlled trials, controlled studies, and large data sets – and some small data sets too,” said Tamar Taddei, MD, associate professor of medicine in the section of digestive disease at Yale University, New Haven, Conn.

Dr. Taddei and colleagues Silvia Vilarinho, MD, PhD; Simona Jakab, MD; and Ariel Jaffe, MD, all also from Yale, selected the papers from among 197 oral and 1,769 poster abstracts presented at AASLD 2020.

They highlighted the most important findings from presentations on autoimmune and cholestatic disease, transplantation, cirrhosis and portal hypertension, alcoholic liver disease, neoplasia, drug-induced liver injury, and COVID-19. They did not review studies focused primarily on nonalcoholic steatohepatitis or nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, viral hepatitis, or basic science, all of which were covered in separate debriefing sessions.
 

Cirrhosis and portal hypertension

A study from the Department of Veterans Affairs looked at the prevalence of liver disease risk factors and rates of subsequent testing for and diagnosis of cirrhosis in the Veterans Health Administration system (VHA).

The authors found that, among more than 6.65 million VHA users in 2018 with no prior diagnosis of cirrhosis, approximately half were at risk for cirrhosis, of whom about 75% were screened, and approximately 5% of those who were screened were positive for possible cirrhosis (133,636). Of the patients who screened positive, about 10% (12,566) received a diagnosis of cirrhosis, including 4,120 with liver decompensation.

“This paper underscores the importance of population-level screening in uncovering unrecognized cirrhosis, enabling intervention earlier in the course of disease,” Dr. Taddei said (Abstract #661).

A study looking at external validation of novel cirrhosis surgical risk models designed to improve prognostication for a range of common surgeries showed that the VOCAL-Penn score was superior to the Mayo Risk Score, Model for End-stage Liver Disease and MELD-sodium scores for discrimination of 30-day and 90-day postoperative mortality (Abstract #91).

“While these models are not a substitute for clinical acumen, they certainly improve our surgical risk prediction in patients with cirrhosis, a very common question in consultative hepatology,” Dr. Taddei said.

She also cited three abstracts that address the important questions regarding performing studies in patients with varices or ascites, including whether it’s safe to perform transesophageal echocardiography in patients with cirrhosis without first screening for varices, and whether nonselective beta-blockers should be continued in patients with refractory ascites.

A retrospective study of 191 patients with cirrhosis who underwent upper endoscopy within 4 years of transesophageal echocardiography had no overt gastrointestinal bleeding regardless of the presence of esophageal varices, suggesting that routine preprocedure esophagogastroduodenoscopy “is of no utility,” (Abstract #1872).

A study to determine risk of sepsis in 1,198 patients with cirrhosis found that 1-year risk of sepsis was reduced by 50% with the use of nonselective beta-blockers (Abstract #94).

The final abstract in this category touched on the use of an advance care planning video support tool to help transplant-ineligible patients with end-stage liver disease decide whether they want support measures such cardiopulmonary resuscitation or intubation. The authors found that the video decision tool was feasible and acceptable to patients, and improved their knowledge of end-of-life care. More patients randomized to the video arm opted against CPR or intubation, compared with those assigned to a verbal discussion of options (Abstract #712).
 

Alcohol

The reviewers highlighted two studies of alcohol use: The first was designed to determine the prevalence of early alcohol relapse (resumption within 3 months) in patients who presented with alcoholic hepatitis. The subjects included 478 patients enrolled in the STOPAH trial, and a validation set of 194 patients from the InTeam (Integrated Approaches for identifying Molecular Targets in Alcoholic Hepatitis) Consortium.

“They found that high-risk patients were younger, unemployed, and without a stable relationship. Intermediate risk were middle aged, employed, and in a stable relationship, and low-risk profiles were older, with known cirrhosis; they were mostly retired and in a stable relationship,” Dr. Taddei said.

The identification of nongenetic factors that predict early relapse may aid in personalization of treatment strategies, she said (Abstract #232).

The second study looked at fecal microbial transplant (FMT) for reducing cravings in adults with alcohol use disorder (AUD) and cirrhosis. The investigators saw a nonsignificant trend toward greater total abstinence at 6 months in patients randomized to FMT versus placebo.

“Future trials should be performed to determine the impact of FMT on altering the gut-brain axis in patients with AUD,” she said (Abstract #7).
 

Transplantation

The prospective controlled QUICKTRANS study by French and Belgian researchers found that patients who underwent early liver transplantation for severe alcoholic hepatitis had numerically but not significantly higher rates of relapse than patients who were transplanted after at least 6 months of abstinence, although heavy drinking was more frequent in patients who underwent early transplant.

The 2-year survival rates for both patients who underwent early transplant and those who underwent transplant after 6 months of sobriety were “identical, and excellent.” In addition, the 2-year survival rate for patients with severe alcoholic hepatitis who underwent transplant was 82.8%, compared with 28.2% for patients who were deemed ineligible for transplant according to a selection algorithm (P­ < .001).

“Perhaps most important is that studies in this population can be conducted in a controlled fashion across centers with reproducible transplant eligibility algorithms,” Dr. Taddei commented (Abstract #6).

The place of honor – Abstract # 1 – was reserved for a study looking at the effects on liver transplant practice of a new “safety net” policy from the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network and United Network for Organ Sharing stating that patients awaiting liver transplantation who develop kidney failure may be given priority on the kidney transplant waiting list.

The investigators found that the new policy significantly increased the number of adult primary liver transplant alone candidates who where on dialysis at the time of listing, and did not affect either waiting list mortality or posttransplant outcomes.

The authors also saw a significant increase in kidney transplant listing after liver transplant, especially for patients who were on hemodialysis at the time of list.

In the period after implementation of the policy, there was a significantly higher probability of kidney transplant, and significant reduction in waiting list mortality.
 

Autoimmune & cholestatic diseases

Investigators performed an analysis of the phase 3 randomized controlled ENHANCE trial of seladelpar in patients with primary biliary cholangitis. The trial was stopped because of an adverse event ultimately deemed to be unrelated to the drug, so the analysis looked at the composite responder rate at month 3.

“The key takeaway from this study is that at the 10-mg dosage of seladelpar, 78% met a composite endpoint, 27% of patients normalized their alkaline phosphatase, and 50% normalized their ALT. There was significant improvement in pruritus,” Dr. Taddei said.

The drug was generally safe and well tolerated. A 52-week phase 3 global registration study will begin enrolling patients in early 2021 (Abstract #LO11).

In a pediatric study, investigators looked at differences in primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC) among various population, and found that “Black and Hispanic patients have dramatically worse clinical outcomes, compared to White and Asian patients. They are more likely to be diagnosed with PSC at an advanced stage with extensive fibrosis and portal hypertensive manifestations.”

The authors suggested that the differences may be explained in part by socioeconomic disparities leading to delay in diagnosis, to a more aggressive phenotype, or both (Abstract #66).

A meta-analysis of maternal and fetal outcomes in women with autoimmune hepatitis showed that the disease is associated with increased risk of gestational diabetes, premature births, and small-for-gestational age or low-birth-weight babies.

“Pregnant women should be monitored closely before, during and after pregnancy. It’s important to know that, in the prevalence data, flares were most prevalent postpartum at 41%. These finds will help us counsel our patients with autoimmune hepatitis who become pregnant,” Dr. Taddei said (Abstract #97).
 

Drug-induced liver injury

A study of clinical outcomes following immune checkpoint inhibitor rechallenge in melanoma patients with resolved higher grade 3 or higher checkpoint inhibitor–induced hepatitis showed that 4 of 31 patients (13%) developed recurrence of grade 2 or greater hepatitis, and 15 of 31 (48%) developed an immune-related adverse event after rechallenge.

There was no difference in time to death between patients who were rechallenged and those who were not, and immune-related liver toxicities requiring drug discontinuation after rechallenge were uncommon.

“High-grade immune checkpoint inhibitor hepatitis should be reconsidered as an absolute contraindication for immune checkpoint inhibitor rechallenge,” Dr. Taddei said (Abstract # 116).
 

Neoplasia

The investigators also highlighted an abstract describing significant urban-rural and racial ethnic differences in hepatocellular carcinoma rates. A fuller description of this study can be found here (Abstract #136).

COVID-19

Finally, the reviewer highlighted a study of the clinical course of COVID-19 in patients with chronic liver disease, and to determine factors associated with adverse outcomes in patients with chronic liver disease who acquire COVID-19.

The investigators found that patients with chronic liver disease and COVID-19 have a 14% morality rate, and that alcohol-related liver disease, decompensated cirrhosis, and hepatocellular carcinoma are all risk factors for increased mortality from COVID-19.

They recommended emphasizing telemedicine, prioritizing patients with chronic liver disease for vaccination, and including these patients in prospective studies and drug trials for COVID-19 therapies.

Dr. Taddei reported having no disclosures.

Migraine aura sometimes accompanies or precedes migraine pain, but the phenomenon is difficult to treat and poorly understood. However, some evidence points to potential neurological mechanisms, and migraine aura is associated with cardiovascular disease risk.

“We now have an accumulating body of evidence that supports cortical spreading depression (CSD) as the underlying pathophysiological event of migraine aura,” Andrea Harriott, MD, PhD, said at the Stowe Headache Symposium sponsored by the Headache Cooperative of New England, which was conducted virtually. Dr. Harriott is assistant professor of neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.

Somewhere between 20% and 40% of patients with migraine experience aura. It is most often visual, though it can also include sensory, aphasic, and motor symptoms. Visual aura usually begins as a flickering zigzag pattern in the central visual field that moves slowly toward the periphery and often leaves a scotoma. Typical duration is 15-30 minutes. Aura symptoms are more common in females.

Research in the 1940s conducted by the Brazilian researcher Aristides de Azevedo Pacheco Leão, PhD, then at Harvard Medical School, Boston, showed evidence of CSD in rabbits after electrical or mechanical stimulation. He observed a wave of vasodilation and increased blood flow over the cortex that spread over nearly the entire dorsolateral cortex within 3-6 minutes.

In the 1940s and 1950s, researchers sketched on paper the visual disturbance over 10 minutes, tracking the expanding spectrum across the visual field, from the center toward the periphery. The resulting scotoma advanced across the visual cortex at a rate very similar to that of the cortical spreading observed by Dr. Leão, “potentially linking this electrical event that was described with the aura event of migraine,” said Dr. Harriott. Those researchers hypothesized that the aura was produced by a strong excitation phase, followed by a wave of total inhibition.

More recent functional magnetic resonance imaging studies have also shown that CSD-like disturbances occur when patients experience migraine aura. In one study, researchers observed an initial increase and then a decrease in the blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) signal, which spread slowly across the visual cortex and correlated with the aura event. “This study was really important in confirming that a CSD-like phenomenon was likely the underlying perturbation that produced the visual aura of migraine,” said Dr. Harriott.

Despite the evidence that CSD causes migraine aura, its connection to migraine pain hasn’t been firmly established. But Dr. Harriott presented some evidence linking the two. Migraine aura is usually followed by pain, and aura precedes migraine attacks 78%-93% of the time. Cephalic allodynia occurs in migraine about 70% to 80% of the time, and migraine with aura is more often associated with severe cutaneous allodynia than is migraine without aura. Finally, migraine patients with comorbidities have more severe disability, and more frequent cutaneous allodynia and aura than does the general migraine population (40% vs. 29%).

All of that suggests that activation of trigeminal nociceptors is involved with migraine aura, according to Dr. Harriott. Preclinical studies have also suggested links between CSD and activation of trigeminal nociceptors, with both immunohistochemical and electrophysiological lines of evidence. “These data suggest that spreading depression actually activates trigeminal nociceptors that we know are involved in signal pain in the head and neck, and that we know are involved in cephalic allodynia as well,” Dr. Harriott said.

The evidence impressed Allan Purdy, MD, professor of medicine at Dalhousie University, Halifax, N.S., who was the discussant for the presentation. “It’s an excellent case that CSD is a remarkably good correlate for aura,” he said during the session.

Along with potential impacts on migraine pain, aura is also associated with cardiovascular risk. “This is really important to know about in our clinical population,” said Dr. Harriott.

Meta-analyses of case control and cohort studies have shown associations between migraine aura and vascular disorders such as ischemic stroke. One meta-analysis showed about a twofold increased risk associated with migraine compared with the nonmigraine population. This difference was driven by migraine with aura (relative risk [RR], 2.25; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.53-3.33) rather than migraine without aura (RR, 1.24; 95% CI, 0.86-1.79). Migraine generally is associated with greater risk of myocardial infarction (adjusted hazard ratio, 1.33; 95% CI, 1.08-1.64), and that association may be stronger in the aura phenotype.

There doesn’t appear to be evidence that traditional risk factors for heart disease – such as hypertension, diabetes, or high cholesterol – play a role in the association between aura and heart disease. One possibility is that variables like platelet activation, hypercoagulable state, or genetic susceptibility could be responsible.

The risks associated with migraine aura should be noted, but with a caveat, according to Dr. Purdy. “Even though the relative risk is high, the absolute risk is still relatively low, and patients with migraine with aura, who smoke or are female and over 45, those are the cases where the worry comes in.”

Dr. Harriott and Dr. Purdy have nothing to disclose.

Migraine aura sometimes accompanies or precedes migraine pain, but the phenomenon is difficult to treat and poorly understood. However, some evidence points to potential neurological mechanisms, and migraine aura is associated with cardiovascular disease risk.

“We now have an accumulating body of evidence that supports cortical spreading depression (CSD) as the underlying pathophysiological event of migraine aura,” Andrea Harriott, MD, PhD, said at the Stowe Headache Symposium sponsored by the Headache Cooperative of New England, which was conducted virtually. Dr. Harriott is assistant professor of neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.

Somewhere between 20% and 40% of patients with migraine experience aura. It is most often visual, though it can also include sensory, aphasic, and motor symptoms. Visual aura usually begins as a flickering zigzag pattern in the central visual field that moves slowly toward the periphery and often leaves a scotoma. Typical duration is 15-30 minutes. Aura symptoms are more common in females.

Research in the 1940s conducted by the Brazilian researcher Aristides de Azevedo Pacheco Leão, PhD, then at Harvard Medical School, Boston, showed evidence of CSD in rabbits after electrical or mechanical stimulation. He observed a wave of vasodilation and increased blood flow over the cortex that spread over nearly the entire dorsolateral cortex within 3-6 minutes.

In the 1940s and 1950s, researchers sketched on paper the visual disturbance over 10 minutes, tracking the expanding spectrum across the visual field, from the center toward the periphery. The resulting scotoma advanced across the visual cortex at a rate very similar to that of the cortical spreading observed by Dr. Leão, “potentially linking this electrical event that was described with the aura event of migraine,” said Dr. Harriott. Those researchers hypothesized that the aura was produced by a strong excitation phase, followed by a wave of total inhibition.

More recent functional magnetic resonance imaging studies have also shown that CSD-like disturbances occur when patients experience migraine aura. In one study, researchers observed an initial increase and then a decrease in the blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) signal, which spread slowly across the visual cortex and correlated with the aura event. “This study was really important in confirming that a CSD-like phenomenon was likely the underlying perturbation that produced the visual aura of migraine,” said Dr. Harriott.

Despite the evidence that CSD causes migraine aura, its connection to migraine pain hasn’t been firmly established. But Dr. Harriott presented some evidence linking the two. Migraine aura is usually followed by pain, and aura precedes migraine attacks 78%-93% of the time. Cephalic allodynia occurs in migraine about 70% to 80% of the time, and migraine with aura is more often associated with severe cutaneous allodynia than is migraine without aura. Finally, migraine patients with comorbidities have more severe disability, and more frequent cutaneous allodynia and aura than does the general migraine population (40% vs. 29%).

All of that suggests that activation of trigeminal nociceptors is involved with migraine aura, according to Dr. Harriott. Preclinical studies have also suggested links between CSD and activation of trigeminal nociceptors, with both immunohistochemical and electrophysiological lines of evidence. “These data suggest that spreading depression actually activates trigeminal nociceptors that we know are involved in signal pain in the head and neck, and that we know are involved in cephalic allodynia as well,” Dr. Harriott said.

The evidence impressed Allan Purdy, MD, professor of medicine at Dalhousie University, Halifax, N.S., who was the discussant for the presentation. “It’s an excellent case that CSD is a remarkably good correlate for aura,” he said during the session.

Along with potential impacts on migraine pain, aura is also associated with cardiovascular risk. “This is really important to know about in our clinical population,” said Dr. Harriott.

Meta-analyses of case control and cohort studies have shown associations between migraine aura and vascular disorders such as ischemic stroke. One meta-analysis showed about a twofold increased risk associated with migraine compared with the nonmigraine population. This difference was driven by migraine with aura (relative risk [RR], 2.25; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.53-3.33) rather than migraine without aura (RR, 1.24; 95% CI, 0.86-1.79). Migraine generally is associated with greater risk of myocardial infarction (adjusted hazard ratio, 1.33; 95% CI, 1.08-1.64), and that association may be stronger in the aura phenotype.

There doesn’t appear to be evidence that traditional risk factors for heart disease – such as hypertension, diabetes, or high cholesterol – play a role in the association between aura and heart disease. One possibility is that variables like platelet activation, hypercoagulable state, or genetic susceptibility could be responsible.

The risks associated with migraine aura should be noted, but with a caveat, according to Dr. Purdy. “Even though the relative risk is high, the absolute risk is still relatively low, and patients with migraine with aura, who smoke or are female and over 45, those are the cases where the worry comes in.”

Dr. Harriott and Dr. Purdy have nothing to disclose.

Migraine aura sometimes accompanies or precedes migraine pain, but the phenomenon is difficult to treat and poorly understood. However, some evidence points to potential neurological mechanisms, and migraine aura is associated with cardiovascular disease risk.

“We now have an accumulating body of evidence that supports cortical spreading depression (CSD) as the underlying pathophysiological event of migraine aura,” Andrea Harriott, MD, PhD, said at the Stowe Headache Symposium sponsored by the Headache Cooperative of New England, which was conducted virtually. Dr. Harriott is assistant professor of neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.

Somewhere between 20% and 40% of patients with migraine experience aura. It is most often visual, though it can also include sensory, aphasic, and motor symptoms. Visual aura usually begins as a flickering zigzag pattern in the central visual field that moves slowly toward the periphery and often leaves a scotoma. Typical duration is 15-30 minutes. Aura symptoms are more common in females.

Research in the 1940s conducted by the Brazilian researcher Aristides de Azevedo Pacheco Leão, PhD, then at Harvard Medical School, Boston, showed evidence of CSD in rabbits after electrical or mechanical stimulation. He observed a wave of vasodilation and increased blood flow over the cortex that spread over nearly the entire dorsolateral cortex within 3-6 minutes.

In the 1940s and 1950s, researchers sketched on paper the visual disturbance over 10 minutes, tracking the expanding spectrum across the visual field, from the center toward the periphery. The resulting scotoma advanced across the visual cortex at a rate very similar to that of the cortical spreading observed by Dr. Leão, “potentially linking this electrical event that was described with the aura event of migraine,” said Dr. Harriott. Those researchers hypothesized that the aura was produced by a strong excitation phase, followed by a wave of total inhibition.

More recent functional magnetic resonance imaging studies have also shown that CSD-like disturbances occur when patients experience migraine aura. In one study, researchers observed an initial increase and then a decrease in the blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) signal, which spread slowly across the visual cortex and correlated with the aura event. “This study was really important in confirming that a CSD-like phenomenon was likely the underlying perturbation that produced the visual aura of migraine,” said Dr. Harriott.

Despite the evidence that CSD causes migraine aura, its connection to migraine pain hasn’t been firmly established. But Dr. Harriott presented some evidence linking the two. Migraine aura is usually followed by pain, and aura precedes migraine attacks 78%-93% of the time. Cephalic allodynia occurs in migraine about 70% to 80% of the time, and migraine with aura is more often associated with severe cutaneous allodynia than is migraine without aura. Finally, migraine patients with comorbidities have more severe disability, and more frequent cutaneous allodynia and aura than does the general migraine population (40% vs. 29%).

All of that suggests that activation of trigeminal nociceptors is involved with migraine aura, according to Dr. Harriott. Preclinical studies have also suggested links between CSD and activation of trigeminal nociceptors, with both immunohistochemical and electrophysiological lines of evidence. “These data suggest that spreading depression actually activates trigeminal nociceptors that we know are involved in signal pain in the head and neck, and that we know are involved in cephalic allodynia as well,” Dr. Harriott said.

The evidence impressed Allan Purdy, MD, professor of medicine at Dalhousie University, Halifax, N.S., who was the discussant for the presentation. “It’s an excellent case that CSD is a remarkably good correlate for aura,” he said during the session.

Along with potential impacts on migraine pain, aura is also associated with cardiovascular risk. “This is really important to know about in our clinical population,” said Dr. Harriott.

Meta-analyses of case control and cohort studies have shown associations between migraine aura and vascular disorders such as ischemic stroke. One meta-analysis showed about a twofold increased risk associated with migraine compared with the nonmigraine population. This difference was driven by migraine with aura (relative risk [RR], 2.25; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.53-3.33) rather than migraine without aura (RR, 1.24; 95% CI, 0.86-1.79). Migraine generally is associated with greater risk of myocardial infarction (adjusted hazard ratio, 1.33; 95% CI, 1.08-1.64), and that association may be stronger in the aura phenotype.

There doesn’t appear to be evidence that traditional risk factors for heart disease – such as hypertension, diabetes, or high cholesterol – play a role in the association between aura and heart disease. One possibility is that variables like platelet activation, hypercoagulable state, or genetic susceptibility could be responsible.

The risks associated with migraine aura should be noted, but with a caveat, according to Dr. Purdy. “Even though the relative risk is high, the absolute risk is still relatively low, and patients with migraine with aura, who smoke or are female and over 45, those are the cases where the worry comes in.”

Dr. Harriott and Dr. Purdy have nothing to disclose.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has expanded the indication for the antiviral baloxavir marboxil (Xofluza) to include postexposure prophylaxis of uncomplicated influenza in people aged 12 years and older.

“This expanded indication for Xofluza will provide an important option to help prevent influenza just in time for a flu season that is anticipated to be unlike any other because it will coincide with the coronavirus pandemic,” Debra Birnkrant, MD, director, Division of Antiviral Products, FDA Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, said in a press release.

In addition, Xofluza, which was previously available only in tablet form, is also now available as granules for mixing in water, the FDA said.

The agency first approved baloxavir marboxil in 2018 for the treatment of acute uncomplicated influenza in people aged 12 years or older who have been symptomatic for no more than 48 hours.

A year later, the FDA expanded the indication to include people at high risk of developing influenza-related complications, such as those with asthma, chronic lung disease, diabetes, heart disease, or morbid obesity, as well as adults aged 65 years or older.

The safety and efficacy of Xofluza for influenza postexposure prophylaxis is supported by a randomized, double-blind, controlled trial involving 607 people aged 12 years and older. After exposure to a person with influenza in their household, they received a single dose of Xofluza or placebo.

The primary endpoint was the proportion of individuals who became infected with influenza and presented with fever and at least one respiratory symptom from day 1 to day 10.

Of the 303 people who received Xofluza, 1% of individuals met these criteria, compared with 13% of those who received placebo.

The most common adverse effects of Xofluza include diarrhea, bronchitis, nausea, sinusitis, and headache.

Hypersensitivity, including anaphylaxis, can occur in patients taking Xofluza. The antiviral is contraindicated in people with a known hypersensitivity reaction to Xofluza.

Xofluza should not be coadministered with dairy products, calcium-fortified beverages, laxatives, antacids, or oral supplements containing calcium, iron, magnesium, selenium, aluminium, or zinc.

Full prescribing information is available online.

This article first appeared on Medscape.com.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has expanded the indication for the antiviral baloxavir marboxil (Xofluza) to include postexposure prophylaxis of uncomplicated influenza in people aged 12 years and older.

“This expanded indication for Xofluza will provide an important option to help prevent influenza just in time for a flu season that is anticipated to be unlike any other because it will coincide with the coronavirus pandemic,” Debra Birnkrant, MD, director, Division of Antiviral Products, FDA Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, said in a press release.

In addition, Xofluza, which was previously available only in tablet form, is also now available as granules for mixing in water, the FDA said.

The agency first approved baloxavir marboxil in 2018 for the treatment of acute uncomplicated influenza in people aged 12 years or older who have been symptomatic for no more than 48 hours.

A year later, the FDA expanded the indication to include people at high risk of developing influenza-related complications, such as those with asthma, chronic lung disease, diabetes, heart disease, or morbid obesity, as well as adults aged 65 years or older.

The safety and efficacy of Xofluza for influenza postexposure prophylaxis is supported by a randomized, double-blind, controlled trial involving 607 people aged 12 years and older. After exposure to a person with influenza in their household, they received a single dose of Xofluza or placebo.

The primary endpoint was the proportion of individuals who became infected with influenza and presented with fever and at least one respiratory symptom from day 1 to day 10.

Of the 303 people who received Xofluza, 1% of individuals met these criteria, compared with 13% of those who received placebo.

The most common adverse effects of Xofluza include diarrhea, bronchitis, nausea, sinusitis, and headache.

Hypersensitivity, including anaphylaxis, can occur in patients taking Xofluza. The antiviral is contraindicated in people with a known hypersensitivity reaction to Xofluza.

Xofluza should not be coadministered with dairy products, calcium-fortified beverages, laxatives, antacids, or oral supplements containing calcium, iron, magnesium, selenium, aluminium, or zinc.

Full prescribing information is available online.

This article first appeared on Medscape.com.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has expanded the indication for the antiviral baloxavir marboxil (Xofluza) to include postexposure prophylaxis of uncomplicated influenza in people aged 12 years and older.

“This expanded indication for Xofluza will provide an important option to help prevent influenza just in time for a flu season that is anticipated to be unlike any other because it will coincide with the coronavirus pandemic,” Debra Birnkrant, MD, director, Division of Antiviral Products, FDA Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, said in a press release.

In addition, Xofluza, which was previously available only in tablet form, is also now available as granules for mixing in water, the FDA said.

The agency first approved baloxavir marboxil in 2018 for the treatment of acute uncomplicated influenza in people aged 12 years or older who have been symptomatic for no more than 48 hours.

A year later, the FDA expanded the indication to include people at high risk of developing influenza-related complications, such as those with asthma, chronic lung disease, diabetes, heart disease, or morbid obesity, as well as adults aged 65 years or older.

The safety and efficacy of Xofluza for influenza postexposure prophylaxis is supported by a randomized, double-blind, controlled trial involving 607 people aged 12 years and older. After exposure to a person with influenza in their household, they received a single dose of Xofluza or placebo.

The primary endpoint was the proportion of individuals who became infected with influenza and presented with fever and at least one respiratory symptom from day 1 to day 10.

Of the 303 people who received Xofluza, 1% of individuals met these criteria, compared with 13% of those who received placebo.

The most common adverse effects of Xofluza include diarrhea, bronchitis, nausea, sinusitis, and headache.

Hypersensitivity, including anaphylaxis, can occur in patients taking Xofluza. The antiviral is contraindicated in people with a known hypersensitivity reaction to Xofluza.

Xofluza should not be coadministered with dairy products, calcium-fortified beverages, laxatives, antacids, or oral supplements containing calcium, iron, magnesium, selenium, aluminium, or zinc.

Full prescribing information is available online.

This article first appeared on Medscape.com.