Sonali Bose, MD: Fluticasone Furoate and Other Therapies for Pediatric Asthma

For as good news as the US Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) approval of fluticasone furoate (Arnuity Ellipta) was for pediatric patients with asthma, it was as welcome to physicians tasked with managing asthma in children.

Sonali Bose, MD, an assistant professor at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, told MD Magazine the indication gives physicians just another option to reduce oral corticosteroid use while preserving pediatric lung function in children.

“This is also great news because it also gives us the confidence to prescribe this medication in children for maintenance,” Bose said.

The current burdens of pediatric asthma treatment are only amplified by the difficulty of testing a once-daily therapy in a clinical trial setting with children patients, Bose noted. Even then, physicians are tasked with addressing a wide array of modern issues in each new patient: environmental factors have worsened over years, as has the pediatric obesity rate.

That said, she finds it particularly exciting to be in the field at a time when clinicians are embracing a comprehensive approach to care.

“I think, for the first time, we’re getting an expansive understanding of all the other factors that are playing a role in asthma, and trying to target them in a global fashion,” Bose said.

From gestational studies to researching respiratory preservation through adolescence, the current pediatric asthma field is honed in on bettering the individual patient.

“If we can find a simple way of delivering medications once a day in a way that will help to reduce the burden of symptoms and other effects, then I think we’re on the right track,” Bose said.