People with allergic rhinitis or asthma who might benefit from allergen immunotherapy aren’t getting identified and onto the long treatment pathway which could potentially be life changing, Australian experts say.
Professor Sinthia Bosnic-Anticevich, from the Woolcock Institute of Medical Research, told the limbic that while allergen immunotherapy was usually delivered by specialists, the first step was recognising those patients in the community who might benefit.
“For example, with allergic rhinitis, the person might actually be self medicating and may not even be talking to a pharmacist. Or if they do get prescribed medication, they are non adherent and living with symptoms and not even telling their GP they are not well.”
Professor Bosnic-Anticevich, a respiratory pharmacist, is one of the Australian co authors on a Pocket Guide on allergen immunotherapy, which has been made available by a joint study group of the Allergic Rhinitis and its Impact on Asthma (ARIA) initiative and the European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (EAACI).
The Guide provides care pathways for the use of sublingual and subcutaneous immunotherapy in patients with allergic rhinitis uncontrolled by symptomatic treatment, and in patients with asthma who are sensitised to house dust mites as an add-on to their regular asthma treatment.
It includes treatment algorithms for both conditions.
Precision medicine
The Guide, published in Clinical and Translational Allergy and reviewed by members from 65 countries including Australia, emphasises the importance of a precision medicine approach including patient stratification.
Professor Bosnic-Anticevich said a structured pathway was required.