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Introduction: Patients affected by severe asthma do not reach disease control despite the use of high doses of ICS, and are often forced to take oral corticosteroid to manage the disease. Some of these patients have an eosinophilic inflammation. Mepolizumab is an approved monoclonal antibody indicated for the treatment of severe eosinophilic asthma targeting IL-5. Treatment with Mepolizumab results in significant reductions of exacerbations, steroids use and blood eosinophils. Aim: To evaluate variations in functionality, inflammatory markers and quality of life in severe asthma patients at baseline (V0) and after 6 months (V1) of therapy with Mepolizumab. Methods: 13 patients with eosinophilic severe asthma were included. The collected variables were inflammatory markers, symptoms, exacerbation, changes in therapy, quality of life and functionality. Results: At V1, only eosinophils in serum decreased significantly (p=0.0002). Significant lower rate of exacerbation and OCS dose were observed (p=0.0002 and p=0.0005, respectively). Good correlation between sputum and serum Eosinophils collected at V0 (r=0.9, p Conclusions: After 6 months of treatment, Mepolizumab improved disease control and lowered the OCS use. Sputum eosinophils count may be used as a marker of treatment response, but serum eosinophils may be actually seen as a “better” marker. Both SGRQ and ACQ are correlated, but SGRQ seems to mirror treatment response better. |
