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Current Radiopharmaceuticals

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ISSN (Print): 1874-4710
ISSN (Online): 1874-4729

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Clinical Trial

World’s First Experience of the Low-Dose Radionuclide Inhalation Therapy in the Treatment of COVID-19-Associated Viral Pneumonia: Phase 1/2 Clinical Trial

Author(s): Peter Shegay, Alexey Leontyev, Denis Baranovskii, German Davydov, Marina Poluektova, Lyudmila Grivtsova, Vasily Petriev, Valeriy Stepanenko, Igor Gulidov, Valeriy Krylov, Svetlana Osadchaya, Vladimir Petrov, Maria Sedova, Mikhail Vekilyan, Olga Krasilnikova, Sergey Morozov, Sergey Ivanov, Ilya Klabukov* and Andrey Kaprin

Volume 16, Issue 3, 2023

Published on: 07 April, 2023

Page: [243 - 252] Pages: 10

DOI: 10.2174/1874471016666230307113045

Price: $65

Abstract

Objective: Previously, low-dose radiation therapy was used for pneumonia treatment. We aimed to investigate the safety and effectiveness of carbon nanoparticles labeled with Technetium isotope (99mTc) in a form of ultradispersed aerosol in combination with standard COVID-19 therapy. The study was a randomized phase 1 and phase 2 clinical trial of low-dose radionuclide inhalation therapy for patients with COVID-19 related pneumonia.

Methods: We enrolled 47 patients with confirmed COVID-19 infection and early laboratory signs of cytokine storm and randomized them into the Treatment and Control groups. We analyzed blood parameters reflecting the COVID-19 severity and inflammatory response.

Results: Low-dose 99mTc-labeled inhalation showed a minimal accumulation of radionuclide in lungs in healthy volunteers. We observed no significant differences between the groups before treatment in WBC-count, D-dimer, CRP, Ferritin or LDH levels. We found that Ferritin and LDH levels significantly raised after the 7th day follow-up only in the Control group (p < 0.0001 and p = 0.0005, respectively), while mean values of the same indicators did not change in patients in the Treatment group after the radionuclide treatment. D-dimer values also lowered in the radionuclide treated group, however, this effect was not statistically significant. Furthermore, we observed a significant decrease in CD19+ cell counts in patients of the radionuclide-treated group.

Conclusion: Inhalation low-dose radionuclide therapy of 99mTc aerosol affects the major prognostic indicators of COVID-19- related pneumonia restraining inflammatory response. Overall, we identified no evidence of major adverse events in the group receiving radionuclide.

Keywords: Low-dose, radionuclide therapy, COVID-19, sodium pertechnetate Tc99m, radiopharmaceuticals, pneumonia.

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