COVID-19: Inhaled budesonide may shorten recovery time

Key clinical point: Inhaled budesonide is associated with a shorter time to recovery but fails to reduce the risk for hospitalization or death in high-risk primary care patients with COVID-19.

Major finding: Budesonide vs usual care was associated with a shorter time to recovery (11.8 days vs 14.7 days). Budesonide was associated with a nonsignificant 2.0% reduction in hospitalization or death compared with usual care.

Study details: The data come from the PRINCIPLE trial, where 2,530 patients were randomly assigned to either inhaled budesonide (n=787), usual care alone (n=1,069), or usual care plus other interventions (n=674).

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Disclosures: The study was funded by the National Institute of Health Research and United Kingdom Research Innovation. M Bafadhel, D Richards, BR Saville, N Berry, MA Detry, M Fitzgerald, S de Lusignan, MI Andersson, PJ Barnes, REK Russell, S Ramakrishnan, FDR Hobbs, and CC Butler reported relationships with pharmaceutical companies and/or research institutions. The remaining authors declared no conflict of interests.

Source: Yu LM et al. Lancet. 2021 Aug 10. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(21)01744-X.