Background: Chronic rhinosinusitis is a common, high-morbidity chronic inflammatory disease, and patients often experience suboptimal outcomes with current medical treatment. The exhalation delivery system with fluticasone (EDS-FLU) may improve care by increasing superior/posterior intranasal corticosteroid deposition.
Objective: To evaluate the efficacy and safety of EDS-FLU versus EDS-placebo in patients with nasal polyps (NP). Coprimary end points were change in nasal congestion and polyp grade. Key secondary end points were Sino-Nasal Outcome Test-22 (SNOT-22) and Medical Outcomes Study Sleep Scale-Revised (MOS Sleep-R). Other prespecified end points included all 4 cardinal symptoms of NP, 36-Item Short Form Health Survey (SF-36), Patient Global Impression of Change (PGIC), Rhinosinusitis Disability Index (RSDI), and key indicators for surgical intervention.
Design: Randomized, double-blind, EDS-placebo-controlled, multicenter study.
Methods: Three hundred twenty-three subjects with NP and moderate-severe congestion/obstruction, most with history of corticosteroid use (94.4%) and/or prior surgery (60.4%), were randomized to EDS-FLU 93 µg, 186 µg, or 372 µg or EDS-placebo twice daily (BID) for 24 weeks (16 double-blind + 8 single-arm extension with EDS-FLU 372 µg BID).
Results: All EDS-FLU doses produced significant improvement in both coprimary end points ( P < .05) and in SNOT-22 total score ( P ≤ .005). EDS-FLU significantly improved all 4 cardinal symptoms of NP ( P < .05), including congestion/obstruction, facial pain/pressure, rhinorrhea/post-nasal drip, and hyposmia/anosmia. Approximately 80% of subjects reported improvement with EDS-FLU, with 65% reporting "much" or "very much" improvement by week 16. Adverse events were generally local in nature and similar to other intranasal steroids studied for similar durations in similar populations, with the most common being epistaxis.
Conclusions: In patients with chronic rhinosinusitis with NP (CRSwNP) who were symptomatic despite high rates of prior intranasal steroid use and/or surgery, EDS-FLU produced statistically significant and clinically meaningful improvements compared to EDS-placebo in multiple subjective and objective outcomes (symptoms, SNOT-22, RSDI, SF-36, PGIC, and NP grade), including all 4 cardinal symptoms of CRSwNP.
Keywords: Sino-Nasal Outcome Test-22; chronic rhinosinusitis; congestion; fluticasone; inflammatory disease; intranasal corticosteroid; intranasal steroids; nasal polyps; obstruction; polyp grade; sinus surgery.