Lusutrombopag: A Review in Thrombocytopenia in Patients with Chronic Liver Disease Prior to a Scheduled Procedure

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Disclosure: The preparation of this review was not supported by any external funding.

Conflicts of interest: Matt Shirley, Emma McCafferty and Hannah Blair are salaried employees of Adis/Springer, are responsible for the article content and declare no relevant conflicts of interest.

Additional information about this Adis Drug Review can be found here.

Abstract

Lusutrombopag (Mulpleta^®), an orally bioavailable, small molecule thrombopoietin receptor agonist, is approved for the treatment of thrombocytopenia in adult patients with chronic liver disease who are scheduled to undergo a procedure. In placebo-controlled phase 3 clinical trials, lusutrombopag significantly increased the proportion of patients who did not require a platelet transfusion prior to the procedure or rescue therapy for bleeding up to 7 days after the scheduled procedure. Lusutrombopag also significantly increased the proportion of patients who were responders (i.e. had a platelet count ≥ 50 x 10⁹/L and an increase of ≥ 20 x 10⁹/L from baseline) compared with placebo. Lusutrombopag is well tolerated, with headache being the most common adverse reaction in lusutrombopag recipients in clinical trials. Thus, lusutrombopag represents a promising emerging therapeutic option for the treatment of thrombocytopenia in adult patients with chronic liver disease who are scheduled to undergo a procedure.