Active clinical trials for "Cystic Fibrosis"

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the long-term safety, tolerability, and efficacy of VX-121/tezacaftor/deutivacaftor (VX-121/TEZ/D-IVA) in participants with cystic fibrosis.

Undernutrition is a common problem in patients with cystic fibrosis (CF) despite international consensus that the patients shall be given 120-200% of energy recommendations. Studies imply that one problem might be that the patients are not compensated for the essential fatty acid deficiency (linoleic acid, LA), which is well known in these patients. This deficiency is shown not to be due to fat malabsorption, but related to an increased turnover of arachidonic acid, a transformation product of LA. This abnormality is related to mutations associated with a more severe clinical phenotype. The most common and typical symptom of LA deficiency is poor growth. Studies in animals have further indicated that many of the symptoms in CF are related to the deficiency. A series of recent prospective studies from Wisconsin corroborate the importance of LA for growth. In Sweden LA has been supplemented to most patients since the late 70´, and the condition of patients have been among the leading in the world regarding growth, pulmonary function and survival. Short-term studies have shown better effect of LA supplementation compared to similar supply of energy without including extra LA. There are few long-term studies, performed before the gene was identified, giving very heterogeneous patient groups in regard to genotype, but with some positive results on growth and physiology. It´s of interest that modern personalized extremely expensive therapy with correctors and potentiators for Cystic Fibrosis Transmembrane Conductance Regulator may influence lipid metabolism. LA might thus tentatively be a cheap adjuvant to this modern therapy, but this has to be specially studied. The aim of the study is to find if there are differences in clinical and metabolic outcome between two groups, blindly given similar amount of extra calories, in one group consisting of linoleic acid.The benefit for the patients would be great if the expected positive effect can be proved in the planned study. The treatment will be cheap and without adverse effects. From socioeconomic point of view is would be a great advantage.

This is pilot study of the immunologic effects of intradermal Bacille Calmette-Guerin (BCG) vaccination of adults with cystic fibrosis (CF), non-CF bronchiectasis (NCFB), and healthy volunteers.

This project consists of a psychological intervention in patients and their families with different chronic diseases in order to carry out a comparative study between medical pathologies to know which are the protective or risk variables for the adaptation to the disease.

Rares diseases are a heterogeneous group of conditions which need important tools for diagnosis. The use of high-throughput sequencing is able to diagnose half of the patients. For the other part it is impossible to conclude due to the presence of variants of unknown significance (VOUS). Functional analysis are needed to bring strong argument to reclassify variants as pathogenic or benign. The main objective is to evaluate the diagnosis yield of this strategy.

Lung transplant is an option for treating end-stage lung disease in cystic fibrosis (CF). In the United States, more people with CF and low lung function die each year than undergo lung transplant. More than half of people with CF who die without a lung transplant were never referred for consideration. Patient preference not to undergo lung transplant may account for 25-40% of decisions to defer referral. Patients' health discussion networks function to support individuals in health related matters and may provide critical support during the lung transplant journey. Increasing awareness of lung transplant, and promoting the process of deliberation and utilization of social support, could reduce the number of people with CF who die without lung transplant. Additionally, the most common patient-endorsed barrier to lung transplant discussions is a worry about being a burden on family and friends after lung transplant. For lung transplant recipients with complex post-operative courses, low social support is associated with increased mortality. Additionally, adequate social support is a requirement at all lung transplant programs in the US. Investigators are interested in understanding how caregivers may benefit from using lung transplant educational resources and how caregivers prepare for having discussions with their loved ones and/or helping them make decisions about lung transplant as a treatment option for advanced CF. The purpose of this study is to test whether an investigator-designed research website compared to no caregiver intervention reduces caregiver burden (assessed with the Brief Assessment Scale for Caregivers, BASC), caregiver preparedness for lung transplant discussions, and caregiver lung transplant knowledge as an ancillary study in a multicenter RCT. Further, investigators will assess patient perceptions of caregiver support as measured by the Social Support Effectiveness Questionnaire (SSE-Q) and evaluate caregivers' willingness to provide support through semi-structured interviews in patient-caregiver dyads. Study involvement will span 6 months and study activities will involve the following: Three Zoom research sessions (15-90 minutes each) Survey assessments and an interview Access to a research website that contains educational resources about lung transplant

With this study, the investigators first want to investigate the respiratory tract microbiome of cystic fibrosis patients. To achieve this, the investigators will collect longitudinal samples of saliva, throat and sputum and process these to determine the microbial composition and compare them over a timecourse of a year. Secondly, the investigators aim to study the influence of a topical microbiome therapy (throat spray) on the microbiome of the upper and lower respiratory tract in cystic fibrosis patients after administration for 6 weeks. Bacterial and cytokine profiles of salivary, throat and sputum samples will be monitored before, during and after intervention.

Exercise testing has become clinically important in the management and ongoing evaluation of patients with Cystic Fibrosis (CF) with higher rates of exercise tolerance and participation previously linked to lower mortality risk (1). Lower exercise capacity generally correlates with more severe lung disease (2,3) and landmark studies suggest that low exercise capacity as measured by peak oxygen capacity (VO2peak) and rate of decline in lung function (FEV1) are strong predictors of mortality (1,4). However not all studies have found pulmonary function tests (PFTs) to be reliable predictors of maximal exercise capacity (5), especially in relatively well preserved lung function (6,7). The wide distribution in physical capacity between fit individuals and end stage disease adds to complexity of assessment. Independent factors of age, genetics, habitual exercise, nutritional status and musculoskeletal conditions are all known to influence physical capacity in patients with CF (8,9). Maximal exercise testing places additional stress on cardiovascular, respiratory and peripheral systems providing more information around multiple influences on disease progression including degree of limitation in these major systems (10,11) and is useful for assessment of exercise desaturation, more common (but not always present) in advanced lung disease (5,12). With prediction of exercise performance and functional capacity from PFTs unreliable and the understanding that health status correlates better with exercise tolerance there has been an increase in maximal exercise testing for patient management (13). Many international centers now regard exercise testing as highly important with many assessing maximal exercise capacity annually to monitor disease progression, identify physical status and drive changes in medical, physiotherapy or nutritional management (14,15). The main vision is to develop a standardized incremental step test protocol suitable for adults with Cystic Fibrosis (CF), all ages, levels of fitness and disease state that is in line with current exercise testing recommendations (15). To develop a more useful field test to assess exercise tolerance and a more "user friendly" test than the currently available laboratory exercise test to allow for early detection of decline in physical function in the day-to-day clinical setting. To date no studies have been published in adults with CF where an incremental exercise step test has been investigated to assess exercise tolerance or determine maximum oxygen uptake (VO2max).

This is a pilot study where the investigators aim to compare initial use of the standard airway clearance device (SACD) with subsequent use of a Portable Intra-Pulmonary Percussion Device (PIAPD) in patients with cystic fibrosis ages 6 -21 years. The primary hypothesis is that there is no effect of PIAPD on FEV1 2 hours after use, there is no effect on perception of effort and efficacy for the PIAPD. If both are equally effective, the latter device provides an alternative that is both cheaper and portable.

Cystic Fibrosis, an inherited autosomal recessive disease, arises from mutations in the CFTR gene. For intronic mutations affecting splicing events, oligonucleotides therapy has the potential to restore the production of the full length CFTR protein. Recent scientific research has demonstrated the potential of this approach to restore full length mRNA CFTR in in vitro human airway cells. The study aims to validate the therapeutic efficacy of oligonucleotide blockers (ONB) that target splicing defects associated to splicing variants in epithelia obtained from patients with Cystic Fibrosis and CFTR-related disorders.