Oral beclomethasone dipropionate as an add-on therapy and response prediction in Korean patients with ulcerative...

We aimed to investigate the oral beclomethasone dipropionate's (BDP) efficacy as an add-on therapy and to clarify the predictive factor for response to oral BDP in Korean ulcerative colitis (UC) patients.

Patients with a stable concomitant drug regimen with exposure to oral BDP (5 mg/day) within 30 days before BDP initiation were included. Partial Mayo score (pMS) was used to evaluate response to oral BDP. Clinical remission (CREM) was defined as a post-treatment pMS ≤ 1 point. Clinical response (CRES) was defined as an at least 2-point decrease in post-treatment pMS and an at least 30% decrease from baseline pMS. Patients without CREM or CRES were considered nonresponders (NRs).

Of all, 37 showed CREM, 19 showed CRES, and 44 were NRs. The CREM group included more patients with mild disease activity (75.7% vs. 43.2%, p = 0.011) than NRs. In contrast to NRs, CREM and CRES patients showed significant improvement of post-treatment erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) and C-reactive protein (CRP) (ESR with p = 0.001, CRP with p = 0.004, respectively). Moreover, the initial rectal bleeding subscore (RBS) was significantly different between CREM and CRES, or NR (both with p < 0.001). In multivariate analyses, initial stool frequency subscore (SFS) of 0 and RBS of 0 were predictive factors for CREM (odds ratio [OR], 15.359; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.085 to 217.499; p = 0.043 for SFS, and OR, 11.434; 95% CI, 1.682 to 77.710; p = 0.013 for RBS).

Oral BDP is an efficacious add-on therapy in Korean UC patients. Patients with initial SFS or RBS of 0 may be particularly good candidates for oral BDP.