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Inner-city children suffer disproportionately from asthma, in part because of heavy allergen exposure to dust mites, cockroaches, mold, and rodents. Omalizumab is a humanized, monoclonal antibody that inactivates free IgE and is approved for treatment of moderate-to-severe allergic asthma in patients older than 11 years.
In a 60-week, NIH-sponsored, multicenter, double-blind trial, researchers randomized 419 inner-city children (age range, 6–20 years) with uncontrolled asthma, sensitization to a perennial allergen, and serum IgE levels between 30 and 1300 IU/mL to receive omalizumab or placebo in addition to guideline-based therapy. Omalizumab was administered subcutaneously every 2 or 4 weeks.
Compared with placebo, omalizumab significantly …