Research Demonstrates Efficacy, Safety of Tralokinumab for Atopic Dermatitis

Tralokinumab was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration for use in patients with moderate-to-severe atopic dermatitis at the end of 2021. To date, several studies have been published exploring its safety profile and efficacy.

In this interview, Katherine Kelly, a fourth-year medical student working with the Wake Forest Department of Dermatology, highlights findings from a narrative review in which she and her coinvestigators evaluated tralokinumab using data from 6 clinical trials.

Can you discuss what led you to conduct this research on tralokinumab?

We conducted an invited review by Dove Press. There has been a lot of emerging data on tralokinumab as another treatment for atopic dermatitis. It has sparked people's interests because it targets IL-13, similar to dupilumab. This is becoming a growing area of interest in the field, so we wanted to expand on that.

What were the design and findings of your study? Did any of the outcomes surprise you?

Our study was a basic literature review, a narrative review, of all the available data. We specifically looked at the main 6 clinical trials already published for tralokinumab.

There were several findings, the primary one being that both at short- and long-term time points, tralokinumab improved Investigators Global Assessment scores, eczema area, and severity index scores, including pruritus, sleep interference, patient-oriented eczema measures, and scoring of atopic dermatitis scores. Both in objective and subjective measures of clinical efficacy, tralokinumab demonstrated improvements compared to placebo.

Tralokinumab was also associated with an improvement in quality of life for a lot of patients. Patients had improved Dermatology Life Quality Index scores, as well as some mental and physical components on 36-Item Short Form Health Surveys, which measure health-related quality of life.

Adverse effects are limited for this drug. The main one is conjunctivitis, but most of the cases of that were mild to moderate. No patients had to discontinue treatment due to the conjunctivitis. Some other adverse effects were upper respiratory infection and headaches, but overall, tralokinumab is pretty well tolerated.

Thank you. What do you think are the possible real-world applications of your findings?

Tralokinumab is definitely a marketable drug for atopic dermatitis. I know dupilumab is the star in the eczema field, but I think it is important to have other options for patients who cannot tolerate or get coverage for dupilumab.

An additional benefit of tralokinumab is that it decreases Staphylococcus aureus colonization and reduces the need for systemic treatment for secondary skin infections, which is something that can happen in patients with eczema.

I think the results are clinically meaningful. The fact that tralokinumab has not only clinically improved patients' disease severity, but also their quality of life, is important.

Do you intend to expand on this research going forward?

Yes. Tralokinumab is a promising drug; however, the clinical trials are still limited. There were only 6 trials at the time of our review. There are probably more studies published at this point, so I think there is an opportunity to update the information as we evaluate bigger trials and more long-term effects.

The longest time point we looked at was 52 weeks, so with more information coming out, I think we will get a better idea of what tralokinumab can do.

About Ms Kelly

Katherine A Kelly is a fourth-year medical student at the Center for Dermatology Research, part of the Wake Forest Department of Dermatology. She has been a research fellow with Steven R Feldman, MD, PhD, professor of dermatology, for the past year.