Sixty patients had been randomized to orBec and the same number to placebo. Serial Pulmonary Function Tests (PFTs) at day 80 were available from 44 and 50 patients on placebo and orBec, respectively. Significantly fewer patients randomized to orBec (55%) had deterioration of pulmonary diffusing capacity by transplant day 80, compared to placebo (79%), p=0.02.
Data suggest that orBec (oral beclomethasone dipropionate or oral BDP) may have a protective effect on early decline in pulmonary diffusing capacity, which commonly occurs by day 80 after transplant because of interstitial lung injury, and that this effect is accompanied by prevention of clinical pulmonary events such as idiopathic pneumonia syndrome and bronchiolitis obliterans.