British doctors have saved the life of a woman with severe swine flu, who had an underlined immuno suppressant disease, by breaking away from the regular treatment regimen and giving her the ‘unlicensed’ intravenous form of GlaxoSmithKline’s drug Relenza.

In an article in Lancet, the doctors at the University College London (UCL) reported success with the controversial ‘treatment’ and asked for more controlled trials of the drug to save lives.

Relenza, or zanamivir is currently only approved as an inhaled medicine. This version, however, did not work in the 22-year-old patient, whose immune system was impaired due to recent chemotherapy for Hodgkin’s disease. She reported to ICU within three days of reporting symptoms but her condition did not get better with Tamiflu.

She also did not respond to Tamiflu, or oseltamivir, which is given as a pill. Though this was not a case of resistance to Tamiflu, the woman was among the few in the world who failed to react to a treatment.

The doctors at UCL, therefore, decided to try intravenous Relenza in combination with high-dose corticosteroids and her condition improved within 48 hours. The researchers write that intravenous zanamivir 600 mg was administered twice daily. The unlicensed antiviral monotherapy was used only after an agreement for use was granted by the Hospital Formulary Committee and next of kin. Methylprednisolone was also started.

“Since her inflamed, atelectatic lungs were probably impeding adequate drug absorption and clinical improvement was not forthcoming, we decided to use intravenous (unlicensed) zanamivir. High dosing achieves effective respiratory epithelial concentrations and is well tolerated,” Dr I Michael Kidd from UCL and his colleagues explain in the report.

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