Avacopan vs Reduced-dose Glucocorticoids in ANCA-associated Vasculitis

Official title

Avacopan With Short-term Reduced-dose Glucocorticoids vs Reduced-dose Glucocorticoids Added to Rituximab on Remission Induction in ANCA-associated Vasculitis

Overview

The goal of this clinical trial is to learn if avacopan in combination with short-term (4 weeks) reduced-dose glucocorticoid and rituximab works to treat patients with newly-onset ANCA-associated vasculitis. It will also learn about the long-term safety of avacopan. The main questions it aims to answer are: Is avacopan in combination with short-term reduced-dose glucocorticoid and rituximab as effective as the combination of 20 week reduced-dose glucocorticoid and rituximab in the proportion of the patients achieving remission? Does avacopan lower the relapse rate compared to the 6 monthly rituximab maintenance therapy? What medical problems do participants have when taking long-term avacopan? Participants will: Be treated with avacopan in combination with short-term (until 4 weeks) reduced-dose glucocorticoid and rituximab (at 0 week) or reduced-dose glucocorticoid (until 20 weeks) and rituximab (at 0, 26, 52 and 78 weeks). Be assessed at 0, 4, 8, 16, 26, 52, 78 and 104 weeks regarding disease status (remission/relapse), disease activity by Birmingham Vasculitis Activity Score ver3, disease damage by Vasculitis Damage Index and adverse events. The primary endpoint is remission rates at 26 weeks.

Detailed description

Anti-neutrophil cytoplasm antibody (ANCA)-associated vasculitis is characterized by a small to medium-size vasculitis and the presence of ANCA. ANCA-associated vasculitis includes microscopic polyangiitis, granulomatosis with polyangiitis and eosinophilic granulomatosis with polyangiitis. ANCA-associated vasculitis can be a life-threatening disease and the mortality is 80% at 1 year in untreated patients. In 2010s, standard therapies for remission induction of ANCA-associated vasculitis were the combination of high-dose glucocorticoids and either cyclophosphamide or rituximab. Although those therapies have high remission rates of 80-90%, mortality at 5 years is still high at 10-20% mainly due to treatments-related adverse events.

In the LoVAS trial (2021, JAMA), the combination of reduced-dose glucocorticoid and rituximab showed non-inferiority to high-dose glucocorticoid and rituximab in remission rates at 6 months. In addition, adverse events were dramatically less in the reduced-dose group than in the high-dose group.

In the ADVOCATE trial (2021, NEJM), the combination of avacopan, newly developed complement C5a inhibitor, and rituximab or cyclophosphamide showed non-inferiority to high-dose glucocorticoid and rituximab or cyclophosphamide in remission rates at 6 months. The avacopan group was allowed to use glucocorticoid within 1 month from the trial entry, and over 80% of patients used glucocorticoid indeed. Regarding adverse events, they were less in the avacopan group than in the glucocorticoid group.

Although both the reduced-dose glucocorticoid regimen in the LoVAS trial and the avacopan regimen in the ADVOCATE trial are effective and safe for patients with ANCA-associated vasculitis, there is no trial directly comparing both regimens at the moment. Thus, in this multicenter, open-label, randomized, non-ineriority, phase 4 trial, the investigators aim to investigate if the combination of avacoapn, short-term (4 weeks) reduced-dose glucocorticoid and rituximab is non-inferior to the combination of reduced-dose glucocorticoid (20 weeks) and rituximab. The investigators also compare safety profiles and disease relapse between the two groups. A total of 160 patients with new-onset ANCA-associated vasculitis (microscopic polyangiitis and granulomatosis with polyangiitis) will be recruited and randomized to the two treatments groups. The primary end point is remission rate at 26 weeks, and the patients will be followed until 104 weeks for assessing disease relapse and long-term safety.

Interventions

• Drug Avacopan, prednisolone and rituximab
  Patients in the avacoapn group will be treated with avacoapn, short-term reduced-dose prednisolone and rituximab.
• Drug Prednisolone and rituximab
  Patients in the glucocorticoid arm will be treated with reduced-dose prednisolone and rituximab.

Primary outcome measures

• Proportions of patients achieving remission [Time frame: 26 weeks]

Secondary outcome measures (12)

• Sustained remission without taking prednisolone at 104 weeks [Time frame: 104 weeks]
• Survival, relapse and end-stage renal disease [Time frame: 26 and 104 weeks]
• Accumulative dose of glucocorticoids [Time frame: 26 and 104 weeks]
• Birmingham Vasculitis Activity Score (BVAS) version 3 [Time frame: 26 and 104 weeks]
• Vasculitis Damage Index (VDI) [Time frame: 104 weeks]
• Short-Form 36 (SF-36) [Time frame: 26 and 104 weeks]
• Serious adverse event (SAE) [Time frame: 26 and 104 weeks]
• Proportions of the patients with new onset diabetes mellitus [Time frame: 26 and 104 weeks]
• Proportions of the patients with new onset hypertension [Time frame: 26 and 104 weeks]
• Proportions of the patients with new onset hyperlipidemia [Time frame: 26 and 104 weeks]
• Proportion of the patients with new onset bone fracture, bone density [Time frame: 104 weeks]
• Number of infections, proportions of the patients with infection [Time frame: 26 and 104 weeks]

Eligibility criteria

Inclusion criteria

• Provision of written informed consent by a patient or a surrogate decision maker
• Age=\>18 years
• New clinical diagnosis of ANCA-associated vasculitis (granulomatosis with polyangiitis, microscopic polyangiitis) consistent with the 2012 Chapel Hill consensus definitions and 2022 EULAR/ACR classification criteria
• Positive test by ELISA, CLEIA or FEIA for proteinase 3-ANCA or myeloperoxidase-ANCA

Exclusion criteria

• Prior treatment for ANCA-associated vasculitis before trial entry
• ANCA-associated vasculitis related glomerulonephritis (eGFR less than 15ml/min) or alveolar hemorrhage (oxygen inhalation more than 2L/min)
• Presence of another multisystem autoimmune disease
• Known infection with HIV; a past or current history of hepatitis B virus or hepatitis C virus infection
• Desire to bear children, pregnancy or lactating
• History of malignancy within the past 5 years or any evidence of persistent malignancy
• Ongoing or recent (last 1 year) evidence of active tuberculosis
• History of severe allergy or anaphylaxis to monoclonal antibody therapy
• Any concomitant condition anticipated to likely require oral systemic glucocorticoids, immunosuppressants, biologics, plasma exchange or IVIg
• Any biological B cell depleting agent (such as rituximab or belimumab)-use within the past 6 months
• Past history of medication of avacopan
• Patients can not take avacopan and prednisolone orally
• Other conditions, in the investigator\'s opinion, inappropriate for the trial entry

Criteria are shown verbatim from the registry (in English). Final eligibility is always assessed by the study center.

Healthy volunteers: No

Study design

Allocation

Randomized

Model

Parallel assignment

Masking

Open label

Primary purpose

Treatment

Study locations

Japan · 22 centers

• Fujita Health University Hospital — Toyoake
• Asahi General Hospital — Asahi
• Chiba Aoba Municipal Hospital — Chiba
• Chiba University — Chiba
• Chiba Rosai Hospital — Ichihara
• Kameda Medical Centre — Kamogawa
• International University of Health and Welfare — Narita
• Japanese Red Cross Narita Hospital — Narita
• … and 14 more centers

Publications

• Exley AR, Bacon PA, Luqmani RA, Kitas GD, Gordon C, Savage CO, Adu D. Development and initial validation of the Vasculitis Damage Index for the standardized clinical assessment of damage in the systemic vasculitides. Arthritis Rheum. 1997 Feb;40(2):371-80. doi: 10.1002/art.1780400222. PMID 9041949
• Mukhtyar C, Lee R, Brown D, Carruthers D, Dasgupta B, Dubey S, Flossmann O, Hall C, Hollywood J, Jayne D, Jones R, Lanyon P, Muir A, Scott D, Young L, Luqmani RA. Modification and validation of the Birmingham Vasculitis Activity Score (version 3). Ann Rheum Dis. 2009 Dec;68(12):1827-32. doi: 10.1136/ard.2008.101279. Epub 2008 Dec 3. PMID 19054820
• Suppiah R, Robson JC, Grayson PC, Ponte C, Craven A, Khalid S, Judge A, Hutchings A, Merkel PA, Luqmani RA, Watts RA; DCVAS INVESTIGATORS. 2022 American College of Rheumatology/European Alliance of Associations for Rheumatology classification criteria for microscopic polyangiitis. Ann Rheum Dis. 2022 Mar;81(3):321-326. doi: 10.1136/annrheumdis-2021-221796. Epub 2022 Feb 2. PMID 35110332
• Robson JC, Grayson PC, Ponte C, Suppiah R, Craven A, Judge A, Khalid S, Hutchings A, Watts RA, Merkel PA, Luqmani RA; DCVAS Investigators. 2022 American College of Rheumatology/European Alliance of Associations for Rheumatology classification criteria for granulomatosis with polyangiitis. Ann Rheum Dis. 2022 Mar;81(3):315-320. doi: 10.1136/annrheumdis-2021-221795. Epub 2022 Feb 2. PMID 35110333
• Hellmich B, Sanchez-Alamo B, Schirmer JH, Berti A, Blockmans D, Cid MC, Holle JU, Hollinger N, Karadag O, Kronbichler A, Little MA, Luqmani RA, Mahr A, Merkel PA, Mohammad AJ, Monti S, Mukhtyar CB, Musial J, Price-Kuehne F, Segelmark M, Teng YKO, Terrier B, Tomasson G, Vaglio A, Vassilopoulos D, Verhoeven P, Jayne D. EULAR recommendations for the management of ANCA-associated vasculitis: 2022 upda PMID 36927642
• Furuta S, Nakagomi D, Kobayashi Y, Hiraguri M, Sugiyama T, Amano K, Umibe T, Kono H, Kurasawa K, Kita Y, Matsumura R, Kaneko Y, Ninagawa K, Hiromura K, Kagami SI, Inaba Y, Hanaoka H, Ikeda K, Nakajima H; LoVAS Collaborators. Effect of Reduced-Dose vs High-Dose Glucocorticoids Added to Rituximab on Remission Induction in ANCA-Associated Vasculitis: A Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA. 2021 Jun 1;325( PMID 34061144
• Jayne DRW, Merkel PA, Schall TJ, Bekker P; ADVOCATE Study Group. Avacopan for the Treatment of ANCA-Associated Vasculitis. N Engl J Med. 2021 Feb 18;384(7):599-609. doi: 10.1056/NEJMoa2023386. PMID 33596356
• Jennette JC, Falk RJ, Bacon PA, Basu N, Cid MC, Ferrario F, Flores-Suarez LF, Gross WL, Guillevin L, Hagen EC, Hoffman GS, Jayne DR, Kallenberg CG, Lamprecht P, Langford CA, Luqmani RA, Mahr AD, Matteson EL, Merkel PA, Ozen S, Pusey CD, Rasmussen N, Rees AJ, Scott DG, Specks U, Stone JH, Takahashi K, Watts RA. 2012 revised International Chapel Hill Consensus Conference Nomenclature of Vasculitides PMID 23045170

Identifiers

NCT: NCT06611696 · CRB0097-24

Primary sources (government registries)

• ClinicalTrials.gov (US NIH)

View this study on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗