Patient and physician perspectives on disease burden in chronic spontaneous urticaria: A real-world US survey.

Background: Chronic spontaneous urticaria (CSU) is frequently associated with severe disease-related symptoms that negatively impact quality of life, but patients and physicians may differ in their opinion on CSU burden.

Objective: To describe the clinical and humanistic burden associated with CSU and level of agreement between patient and physician perceptions for disease burden and treatment satisfaction.

Methods: This cross-sectional, survey-based study of US physicians and their adult patients with CSU included data collected in the Adelphi CSU Disease Specific Programme™ from 2020 to 2021.

Creating a plasma coordination center to support COVID-19 outpatient trials across a national network of hospital blood banks.

Introduction: In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we rapidly implemented a plasma coordination center, within two months, to support transfusion for two outpatient randomized controlled trials. The center design was based on an investigational drug services model and a Food and Drug Administration-compliant database to manage blood product inventory and trial safety.

Methods: A core investigational team adapted a cloud-based platform to randomize patient assignments and track inventory distribution of control plasma and high-titer COVID-19 convalescent plasma of different blood groups from 29 donor collection centers directly to blood banks serving 26 transfusion sites.

Inhaled Reliever Therapies for Asthma: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

Importance: The optimal inhaled reliever therapy for asthma remains unclear.

Objective: To compare short-acting β agonists (SABA) alone with SABA combined with inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) and with the fast-onset, long-acting β agonist formoterol combined with ICS for asthma.

Data Sources: The MEDLINE, Embase, and CENTRAL databases were searched from January 1, 2020, to September 27, 2024, without language restrictions.

Factors Affecting Adherence in Allergic Disorders and Strategies for Improvement.

Addressing patient adherence is a key element in ensuring positive health outcomes and improving health-related quality of life for patients with atopic and immunologic disorders. Understanding the complex etiologies of patient nonadherence and identifying real-world solutions is important for clinicians, patients, and systems to design and effect change. This review serves as an important resource for defining key issues related to patient nonadherence and outlines solutions, resources, knowledge gaps, and advocacy areas across five domains: health care access, financial considerations, socioenvironmental factors, health literacy, and psychosocial factors.

Patient-Reported Outcomes in Asthma.

Food and Drug Administration's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research defines patient-reported outcomes as "any report of the status of a patient's health condition, health behavior, or experience with healthcare that comes directly form the patient, without interpretation of the patient's response by a clinician or anyone else." Validated patient-reported outcome measures are used extensively in pediatric and adult asthma across clinical and research settings to assess the impact of treatments on patient outcomes over time. This work aims to review some of the most commonly used asthma patient-reported outcomes across the following criteria: validity, reliability, responsiveness, time to complete, ease of administration, target population, recall period, scoring method, availability in different languages, use in clinical practice or research settings, licensing requirements, and cost of use.

Outpatient COVID-19 convalescent plasma recipient antibody thresholds correlated to reduced hospitalizations within a randomized trial.

BACKGROUNDCOVID-19 convalescent plasma (CCP) virus-specific antibody levels that translate into recipient posttransfusion antibody levels sufficient to prevent disease progression are not defined.METHODSThis secondary analysis correlated donor and recipient antibody levels to hospitalization risk among unvaccinated, seronegative CCP recipients within the outpatient, double-blind, randomized clinical trial that compared CCP to control plasma. The majority of COVID-19 CCP arm hospitalizations (15/17, 88%) occurred in this unvaccinated, seronegative subgroup.

Pharmacoequity and Biologics in the Allergy Clinic: Providing the Right Care, at the Right Time, Every Time, to Everyone.

Pharmacoequity refers to equity in access to pharmacotherapy for all patients and is an especially large barrier to biologic agents in patients with allergic diseases. Value-based care models can prompt clinicians to address social determinants of health, promoting pharmacoequity. Pharmacoequity is influenced by numerous factors including socioeconomic status, which may be mediated through insurance status, educational attainment, and access to specialist care.

Digital inhalers for asthma management.

Purpose Of Review: Although digital inhaler systems for asthma management have been commercially available for over a decade, their current use in clinical practice is limited. This review outlines barriers and offers potential solutions to their implementation.

Recent Findings: Digital inhaler systems demonstrate increased controller medication adherence, decreased quick-relief medication use, and improved asthma control.

Effectiveness of a Maintenance and Reliever Digihaler System in Asthma: 24-Week Randomized Study (CONNECT2).

Background: Digital health tools have been shown to help address challenges in asthma control, including inhaler technique, treatment adherence, and short-acting β-agonist overuse. The maintenance and reliever Digihaler System (DS) comprises 2 Digihaler inhalers (fluticasone propionate/salmeterol and albuterol) with an associated patient App and web-based Dashboard. Clinicians can review patients' inhaler use and Digihaler inhalation parameter data to support clinical decision-making.

COVID-19 convalescent plasma therapy decreases inflammatory cytokines: a randomized controlled trial.

This study examined the role that cytokines may have played in the beneficial outcomes found when outpatient individuals infected with SARS-CoV-2 were transfused with COVID-19 convalescent plasma (CCP) early in their infection. We found that the pro-inflammatory cytokine IL-6 decreased significantly faster in patients treated early with CCP. Participants with COVID-19 treated with CCP later in the infection did not have the same effect.

Cost-effectiveness of budesonide-formoterol vs inhaled epinephrine in US adults with mild asthma.

Background: The management of mild asthma has lacked an over-the-counter (OTC) option aside from inhaled epinephrine, which is available in the United States. However, inhaled epinephrine use without an inhaled corticosteroid may increase the risk of asthma death.

Objective: To compare the cost-effectiveness of OTC as-needed budesonide-formoterol as a plausible alternative to inhaled epinephrine.

Early antibody treatment, inflammation, and risk of post-COVID conditions.

Approximately 20% of individuals infected with SARS-CoV-2 experienced long-term health effects, as defined PCC. However, it is unknown if there are any early biomarkers associated with PCC or whether early intervention treatments may decrease the risk of PCC. In a secondary analysis of a randomized clinical trial, this study demonstrates that among outpatients with SARS-CoV-2, increased IL-6 at time of infection is associated with increased odds of PCC.

Dynamics of inflammatory responses after SARS-CoV-2 infection by vaccination status in the USA: a prospective cohort study.

Background: Cytokines and chemokines play a critical role in the response to infection and vaccination. We aimed to assess the longitudinal association of COVID-19 vaccination with cytokine and chemokine concentrations and trajectories among people with SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Methods: In this longitudinal, prospective cohort study, blood samples were used from participants enrolled in a multi-centre randomised trial assessing the efficacy of convalescent plasma therapy for ambulatory COVID-19.

Coordinated Health Care Interventions for Childhood Asthma Gaps in Outcomes (CHICAGO) plan.

Background: Evidence-based strategies to improve outcomes in minority children with uncontrolled asthma discharged from the emergency department (ED) are needed.

Objectives: This multicenter pragmatic clinical trial was designed to compare an ED-only intervention (decision support tool), an ED-only intervention and home visits by community health workers for 6 months (ED-plus-home), and enhanced usual care (UC).

Methods: Children aged 5 to 11 years with uncontrolled asthma were enrolled.

Transfusion reactions associated with COVID-19 convalescent plasma in outpatient clinical trials.

Background: COVID-19 convalescent plasma (CCP) is an important therapeutic option for outpatients at high risk of hospitalization from SARS-CoV-2 infection. We assessed the safety of outpatient CCP transfusions administered during clinical trials.

Study Design And Methods: We analyzed data pertaining to transfusion-related reactions from two randomized controlled trials in the U.

Social Determinants of Health and COVID-19.

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has disproportionately affected disadvantaged populations. Many of the factors related to the disproportionate impact on underserved communities are related to social determinants of health, defined by the World Health Organization as the nonmedical factors that influence health outcomes. They include the wider set of forces and systems shaping the conditions of daily life.

Preference for and impact of telehealth vs in-person asthma visits among Black and Latinx adults.

Background: Black and Latinx adults experience disproportionate asthma-related morbidity and limited specialty care access. The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 pandemic expanded telehealth use.

Objective: To evaluate visit type (telehealth [TH] vs in-person [IP]) preferences and the impact of visit type on asthma outcomes among Black and Latinx adults with moderate-to-severe asthma.