Abstract

Benralizumab is a monoclonal antibody used in the treatment of severe eosinophilic asthmatics. Our own previous real-life study has shown rapid clinical improvements after already the first dose of benralizumab (Renner et al. Allergy. 2020 Dec).

The primary aim of this real-life study is to investigate if these rapid improvements are sustained at 12 months.

We retrospectively analysed asthma control in all patients who had received benralizumab at our asthma clinic for at least 12 months.

38 patients received benralizumab for at least 12 months and 9 patients for at least 24 months. Asthma control, measured with the asthma control questionnaire 6-item scale (ACQ6) and the asthma control test (ACT), showed clinically and statistically significant improvements which were sustained over 12 and 24 months. At 12 months median ACQ6 improved by 1.83 points (p<.001) and median ACT by 6.5 points (p<.001). At 24 months median ACQ6 improved by 1.83 points (p=.012) and median ACT by 10 points (p=.012). 24% had previously received other monoclonal antibody treatments for severe asthma. 47% were former smokers, suggesting that many patients in this real-life study were severe asthmatics not represented in randomized controlled trials.

These results show, that benralizumab is an effective therapy in patients with severe eosinophilic asthma treated in real life and that the improvements are sustained over a time period of at least of 1 year. This is also true for patients (n=9) receiving benralizumab for 2 years. Furthermore, the baseline characteristics of our patients suggest, that this effectiveness also applies to patients excluded from randomized controlled trials.