Aim: A systematic literature review and network meta-analysis assessed the efficacy and safety of reslizumab 3.0 mg/kg and mepolizumab 100 mg. Materials & methods: Eligible studies evaluated reslizumab and mepolizumab in patients with inadequately-controlled severe eosinophilic asthma. Using a Bayesian network meta-analysis, 95% credible intervals and posterior probabilities were reported. Results: Of 19 indirect efficacy comparisons performed in base-case (Global Initiative for Asthma 4/5 patients with ≥2 exacerbations in the previous year) and overall populations, significant differences favoring reslizumab were observed for severe exacerbations, FEV₁ at 4 weeks and eosinophil counts at 4, 16 and 24 weeks, with no other significant differences including risk of adverse events. Conclusion: Indirect comparison of reslizumab and mepolizumab largely showed no significant differences in efficacy or safety.

Keywords:

Papers of special note have been highlighted as: •• of considerable interest

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Received 9 July 2019

Accepted 16 October 2019

Published online 5 November 2019

Published in print December 2019

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Supplementary data

To view the supplementary data that accompany this paper please visit the journal website at: www.future-science.com/doi/suppl/10.2217/imt-2019-0113

Financial & competing interests disclosure

This study was sponsored by Teva Pharmaceuticals. Teva Pharmaceuticals did not participate in study screening or data extraction. K Yan, E Druyts, C Balijepalli and R Sharma are former employees of Precision Xtract; all declare they have no conflicts of interest. SX Sun is a former employee of Teva Pharmaceuticals USA, and S Barakat and S Falcao are former employees of Teva Canada Innovations. JM FitzGerald is a professor at University of British Columbia and serves on the advisory board of GSK, AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, Novartis, and Sanofi Regeneron. JM FitzGerald received research grants from GSK, AstraZeneca, Sanofi and Novartis through University of British Columbia. JM FitzGerald also received honoraria from AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, Novartis, Sanofi Regeneron, and GSK. The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.

Medical writing support was was provided by IC Grieve of Ashfield Healthcare Communications, part of UDG Healthcare plc, and was funded by Teva Pharmaceuticals.

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