Transcript
Dr. Larry Eichenfield (00:04):
Hi, I'm Dr. Larry Eichenfield. I work at Rady Children's Hospital where I run the pediatric dermatology group, and I'm also vice chair of the Department of Dermatology at the University of California, San Diego. So pediatric atopic dermatitis has this variation in severity. We have mild patients to severe patients, and topical therapy is still a mainstay of treatment for atopic dermatitis in pediatrics. And certainly we want anti-inflammatory medicines that can adequately control our atopic dermatitis. So tolerability is crucially important in terms of topical therapy. We're in a new age now having newer non-steroidal agents, so we don't have to use just topical corticosteroids. And I think what we want is an agent that's very tolerable, doesn't have stinging or burning, is effectively anti-inflammatory, and therefore there's less disadvantage in using it. Also, very importantly, I think we look at agents that we don't have concerns about systemic absorption.
(01:18):
And some of our non-steroidal agents, you don't have to really worry about absorption leading to systemic side effects. Why does this matter? Because we want patients to be able to use the medicines without families being concerned about them, and we'd like effective control. Another point I like to stress about pediatric atopic dermatitis topical therapy is we really want to be able to get a rapid control of the signs and symptoms of the disease, decreasing the rash and the itch. But we'd also like persistent control, and that's some of the things that we see. For instance, in certain of our topical studies, if we have an area that clears with the use of a topical agent, tapinarof, for instance, has some data where you can go almost 80 days after discontinuing treatment to an area before the next need to treat, you can have this treatment-free interval. So I think persistence of response. In other studies, we have short-term use and then use as needed over a year of our different non-steroidal agents. So I think these aspects of safe, effective therapy with a good persistent response is something that can really help our patients.
