Omadacycline equivalent to linezolid for skin infections

SAN FRANCISCO – In early October, the Food and Drug Administration approved omadacycline (Nuzyra) for the treatment of community-acquired bacterial pneumonia and acute bacterial skin and skin structure infections in adults.

The drug is a synthetic tetracycline designed to overcome some of the resistance mechanisms that can undermine traditional tetracycline drugs. It gained approval on the strength of the Oasis-1 (NCT03482011) and Oasis-2 (NCT03535194) trials, which demonstrated the drug’s noninferiority to linezolid.

At IDWeek 2018, researchers combined the data from the two pivotal trials to gain more power in some of the secondary endpoints, such as adverse events.

Paul McGovern, MD, vice president of clinical and medical affairs at Paratek, which markets omadacycline, discussed the results of the analysis at an annual scientific meeting on infectious diseases.

Combined, the two studies included 691 patients who received omadacycline and 689 who received linezolid. The two drugs achieved similar results for early clinical response, defined as at least a 20% reduction in lesion size 48-72 hours after the first dose. The mean reduction in baseline lesion area at day 3 was 53.4% in the omadacycline group and 53.0% in the linezolid group. At the end of the treatment period, those values were 93.9% and 93.7%, respectively, Dr. McGovern reported.

A total of 28.5% of patients receiving omadacycline reported drug-related treatment-emergent adverse events, compared with 16.1% of the linezolid group. The omadacycline group experienced higher frequency of nausea (21.9% vs. 8.7%) and vomiting (11.4% vs. 3.9%), he said.

The Oasis 1 and Oasis 2 studies were funded by Paratek. Dr. McGovern is an employee of Paratek.

SOURCE: McGovern P et al. IDWeek 2018, poster abstract 1347.