Tezspire is a drug for severe asthma and Forxiga is used to treat chronic heart failure
AstraZeneca has announced that Tezspire, used for severe asthma, and Forxiga, used to treat chronic heart failure, have been recommended for use within NHS Scotland by the Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC).
Tezpire, also known as tezepelumab, has been accepted for restricted use by the SMC as an ‘add-on’ treatment among adult and adolescent patients aged 12 years and older with severe asthma, after it showed a 56% reduction in the annualised asthma exacerbation rate in its phase 3 clinical trial, NAVIGATOR.
The individuals concerned will have been inadequately controlled, in spite of high dosages of inhaled corticosteroids plus an additional medicinal product for maintenance treatment.
Furthermore, patients must have had three or more asthma attacks during the previous year while not receiving maintenance treatment with oral corticosteroids. Other patients that meet the criteria will be those with only a certain amount of blood eosinophils and who are not receiving maintenance treatment with oral corticosteroids.
Meanwhile, Foxiga, otherwise known as dapagliflozin, showed a reduced risk of a primary composite outcome of worsening heart failure in its phase 3 trial, DELIVER. It has been accepted across Scotland for adult patients to treat symptomatic chronic heart failure with left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF).
Professor Tom Fardon, consultant physician in respiratory medicine at NHS Tayside, was in no doubt about the recommendations and the positive effect they would have on patient lives: “Tezepelumab has the potential to treat a broad population of patients as a first-in-class biologic treatment for severe asthma, affecting multiple steps in the inflammatory cascade, demonstrating efficacy across multiple phenotypes.”
He concluded: “This acceptance by the SMC for restricted use importantly widens access for biologic treatment to more patients in Scotland.”
AstraZeneca believes that over 27,000 relevant people – around 4,000 people with severe uncontrolled asthma and more than 23,000 people with symptomatic chronic heart failure with LVEF – may be eligible for treatment across Scotland.
These SMC verdicts will now allow people throughout the UK to be treated with Forxiga and Tezspire.
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