Combination ICS/fast-onset LABA inhaler as maintenance and reliever therapy: the future for uncontrolled adult...

In the Single combination inhaler as Maintenance And Reliever Therapy (SMART) regimen, asthma patients use a corticosteroid/fast-onset long-acting beta-agonist inhaler as both regular maintenance and reliever therapy. In this multicenter, double-blind randomized controlled trial, Papi et al. have demonstrated that treatment with the combination beclometasone/formoterol hydrofluoroalkane (HFA)-MDI when used as both maintenance and reliever therapy significantly prolongs the time to the first severe asthma exacerbation and reduces severe exacerbations compared with the same fixed dose of maintenance beclometasone/formoterol HFA-MDI with salbutamol MDI for relief. These findings are consistent with those of the prior studies of the SMART regimen with the budesonide/formoterol DPI and extend the evidence for use of the SMART regimen to the extrafine beclometasone/formoterol HFA-MDI, to patients with high baseline reliever use, and to patients in whom the SMART regimen results in a step up, step down or no change in baseline inhaled corticosteroid dose.