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Safety of Long-Acting β-Agonists
- Harold S. Nelson, MD; and
- Paul M. Dorinsky, MD
- From National Jewish Research and Medical Center, Denver, Colorado, and GlaxoSmithKline, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina.
TO THE EDITOR:
Salpeter and colleagues (1) assert that concomitant use of inhaled corticosteroids does not adequately protect against rare adverse events that are associated with long-acting β-agonist (LABA) use. However, their meta-analysis includes only studies in which patients were randomly assigned to LABAs or placebo and nearly 50% of patients were not receiving concomitant inhaled corticosteroids. The authors attempt to control for this limitation by examining studies that reported concomitant inhaled corticosteroid use in more than 75% of patients, but adherence to unblinded inhaled corticosteroid use in those studies is unknown. In addition, all patients reported using inhaled corticosteroids in addition to study medications in only 1 study; therefore, only that …
