A new HCPLive interview featured a discussion with Evan S. Dellon, MD, MPH, during which he discussed trial data showing that eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE) patients treated with dupilumab had high rates of allergic/atopic comorbidities.¹

He serves as a professor of medicine and as adjunct professor of epidemiology at the Center for Esophageal Diseases and Swallowing, University of North Carolina School of Medicine.

Dellon’s subanalysis of data was presented at the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI) 2023 Annual Meeting in San Antonio, TX.

He discussed some of the results, as well as several other questions, from the phase 3 trial examining EoE patients titled LIBERTY-EoE-TREET.

“In the first part of this study, which was part A, where patients were randomized either to dupilumab or placebo, there was evidence in the blood that certain inflammatory markers decreased,” he said. “So the presentation here is looking at part B of the study, and primarily, again, the placebo versus weekly dupilumab. And looking at the effect on three different biomarkers, one called TARC, one called eotaxin-3, and then the IGE antibody.”

Dellon noted that what his team did see was, essentially, no change in these blood markers in the placebo group over 24 weeks of treatment.

He added that they did find a substantial decrease in the dupilumab-treated group for all 3 of these.

“It was a pretty good decrease,” he said. “It started as early as 4 weeks and then persisted over the 24 weeks of the study. And so…first of all, it suggests that the medication is biologically active and working on these mechanisms, or we think it would work.”

Dellon further described his team’s analysis, adding another key point to their findings.

“The last part that we looked at in this particular study is that we looked at whether the baseline levels might ultimately predict the response to dupilumab,” he said. “And it turned out actually it did not, which is a similar thing in the field, that we have a hard time predicting treatment response.

Nevertheless, he noted that this was a strong improvement observed by his team, compared to placebo with these biomarkers.

To find out more about Dellon’s AAAAI presentations, view the full interview segment above.

References

1. Rothenberg, Marc et al. Patients with eosinophilic esophagitis have a high baseline burden of atopic/allergic comorbidities: from Parts A and B of LIBERTY-EoE-TREET. Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, Volume 151, Issue 2, AB88. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaci.2022.12.279.