Efficacy and safety of eltrombopag in combination with dexamethasone as first‐line treatment in adult patients with newly diagnosed immune thrombocytopenia
Year: 2026
Type: article
Study design: Clinical Trial
Abstract: Left panel: Scheme of the XPAG-ITP trial. The dexamethasone monotherapy (DEX) arm consisted of DEX 40 mg/day for days 1–4 for one to three cycles every 28 days to a maximum of 12 weeks, cycles 2 + 3 were optional. Patients randomised to eltrombopag combined with dexamethasone (ETB + DEX) received eltrombopag (ETB) in combination with a short course of high-dose DEX beginning on day 1 (40 mg/day during days 1–4). The starting dose of ETB was 50 mg/day for 2 weeks; thereafter, the ETB dose was increased by 25 mg for all patients who did not achieve the target platelet count of ≥50 × 109/L. The ETB tapering was performed by decreasing the dose by 25 mg every 2 weeks to a minimum dose of 25 mg every other day for all patients. Right upper panel: Clinical outcomes in patients treated with first-line ETB + DEX. Patients displayed a qualitatively longer response duration and qualitatively reduced usage of rescue medication. Right lower panel: The immunological T-cell response was different in treatment responders and non-responders. Patients with sustained response (responders) displayed a high T-cell clonality at baseline. Clones are depicted as bubbles (right side).
Source: British Journal of Haematology
DOI: 10.1111/bjh.70312
Authors: Annaïse J. Jauch, Paul Schmidt‐Barbo, Christoph Schultheiss, Gerda Silling, Mathias Hänel, Jörg Chromik, Thomas Stauch, Karolin Trautmann‐Grill, Roland Repp, Clemens Schulte, Bastian Fleischmann, Manfred Welslau, Martina Stauch, Claudia Quiering, Frank Richter, Tamara Tesanovic, Sabine Jahn, Olivier Bignucolo, Andreas Holbro, Jakob R. Passweg, Axel Matzdorff, Mathias Rummel, Oliver Meyer, Falk Nimmerjahn, Mascha Binder
Institutions: University Hospital of Basel, University of Basel, RWTH Aachen University, Klinikum Chemnitz, Goethe University Frankfurt, University Hospital Frankfurt, Jena University Hospital, Technische Universität Dresden, Klinikum Aschaffenburg, Novartis (Germany), SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg
Language: English
Subfield: Hematology
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W7118718339