Brain Advance Access originally published online on March 2, 2007
Brain 2007 130(9):2245-2257; doi:10.1093/brain/awm004
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Review Article |
Immunotherapy for Guillain-Barré syndrome: a systematic review
1Department of Clinical Neuroscience, King's College London, Guy's Campus, London, UK, 2Service de Réanimation Médicale, Hôpital Raymond Poincaré, Garches, France and 3Department of Neurology, Erasmus MC, University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands
Correspondence to: Prof. Richard Hughes, Department of Clinical Neuroscience, King's College London, Guy's Campus, London SE1 1UL, UK E-mail: richard.a.hughes{at}kcl.ac.uk
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Summary |
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Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) is an acute inflammatory disorder of the peripheral nervous system thought to be due to autoimmunity for which immunotherapy is usually prescribed. To provide the best evidence on which to base clinical practice, we systematically reviewed the results of randomized trials of immunotherapy for GBS. We searched the Cochrane Library, MEDLINE and EMBASE in July 2006 and used the methods of the Cochrane Neuromuscular Disease Group to extract and synthesize data. Almost all trials used a 7-point disability grade scale. In four trials with altogether 585 severely affected adult participants, those treated with plasma exchange (PE) improved significantly more on this scale 4 weeks after randomization than those who did not, weighted mean difference (WMD) –0.89 (95% confidence interval (CI) –1.14 to –0.63). In five trials with altogether 582 participants, the improvement on the disability grade scale with intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIg) was very similar to that with PE, WMD –0.02 (95% CI –0.25 to 0.20). There was also no significant difference between IVIg and PE for any of the other outcome measures. In one trial with 148 participants, following PE with IVIg did not produce significant extra benefit. Limited evidence from three open trials in children suggested that IVIg hastens recovery compared with supportive care alone. Corticosteroids were compared with placebo or supportive treatment in six trials with altogether 587 participants. There was significant heterogeneity in the analysis of these trials which could be accounted for by analysing separately four small trials of oral corticosteroids with altogether 120 participants, in which there was significantly less improvement after 4 weeks with corticosteroids than without, WMD –0.82 (95% CI –0.17 to –1.47), and two large trials of intravenous methylprednisolone with altogether 467 participants, in which there was no significant difference between corticosteroids and placebo WMD –0.17 (95% CI 0.06 to –0.39). None of the treatments significantly reduced mortality. Since
20% of patients die or have persistent disability despite immunotherapy, more research is needed to identify better treatment regimens and new therapeutic strategies.
Key Words: Guillain-Barré syndrome; treatment; systematic review; plasma exchange; intravenous immunoglobulin; corticosteroid
Abbreviations: CI, confidence interval; GBS, Guillain-Barré syndrome; IVIg, intravenous immunoglobulin; PE, plasma exchange; RR, relative rate; WMD, weighted mean difference
Received December 28, 2006. Accepted January 5, 2007.
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Introduction |
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Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) is the major cause of acute neuromuscular paralysis with an annual incidence of 1.3–2 per 100 000 throughout the world (Van Koningsveld et al., 2000
; Govoni and Granieri, 2001). It is a clinical syndrome whose pathological substrate may be acute inflammatory demyelinating polyradiculoneuropathy (AIDP) or acute axonal motor or motor and sensory axonal neuropathy (Griffin et al., 1995). AIDP is much more common than axonal forms in the Western world. Experimental evidence implicates autoantibodies to gangliosides as the cause of the axonal subgroups of GBS and of Fisher syndrome (Willison and Yuki, 2002). These autoantibodies may be generated by the immune response to an infective organism, such as Campylobacter jejuni, cross-reacting with epitopes on the axon (Yuki et al., 2004). The resemblance of AIDP to experimental autoimmune neuritis suggests pathogenetic mechanisms involving T-cell induced macrophage-associated demyelination (Hughes and Cornblath, 2005). This proposed autoimmune aetiology led to the introduction of immunotherapy. Before its introduction, 10% of patients died and 20% were left seriously disabled (Winer et al., 1988). Plasma exchange (PE) was introduced as a possible treatment in 1978 (Brettle et al., 1978) and was shown to offer significant benefit by a randomized trial published in 1985 (The Guillain-Barré Syndrome Study Group, 1985). It became the gold standard against which other treatments were measured (Consensus Conference, 1986). Intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIg) was introduced for GBS in 1988 (Kleyweg et al., 1988). In 1992, the first randomized trial comparing IVIg and PE showed similar effects from each treatment (van der Meché et al., 1992). Corticosteroids were introduced for GBS in the early 1950s (Stillman and Ganong, 1952; Hughes, 1990). The first randomized trial, of ACTH, published in 1976 did not show a significant effect (Swick and McQuillen, 1976) but the most recent trial reported possible minor short-term benefit when high dose intravenous methylprednisolone was combined with IVIg (Van Koningsveld et al., 2004). The significance of this benefit has been debated (Hughes, 2004). This review is based on the individual Cochrane systematic reviews of PE, IVIg and corticosteroid treatment for GBS (Raphaël et al., 2002; Hughes et al., 2006a, b). Cochrane systematic reviews are updated regularly and the Cochrane Library should be consulted for the latest version of each review. We systematically review the evidence on which to base immunotherapy and indicate areas for further research. |
Material and methods |
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Data acquisition
We used the search strategy of the Cochrane Neuromuscular Disease Group (Annane et al., 2004
). We searched the Cochrane Library and the trials register of the Group, MEDLINE and EMBASE for randomized trials using Guillain-Barré syndrome or acute polyradiculoneuritis and plasma exchange or plasmapheresis or intravenous immunoglobulin or corticosteroid or adrenocorticotrophic hormone or treatment or therapy as the search terms. We also searched for quasi-randomized trials, which are those which use methods such as alternate allocation and are not truly randomized. We checked the bibliographies in reports of the randomized trials and contacted their authors and other experts to identify additional published or unpublished data. We updated these searches on July 13, 2006. Two reviewers checked titles and abstracts identified from these sources and obtained the full text of all potentially relevant studies for independent assessment. Two reviewers decided which trials fitted the inclusion criteria and extracted data independently onto specially designed forms. Disagreements were resolved by reference to the original reports and discussion. Some missing data were obtained from the authors.
Efficacy end points and populations
In most trials disability had been measured with a simple 7-point scale, the GBS disability scale (Table 1) (Hughes et al., 1978). For patients with such severe disease that they could not walk independently (GBS disability grade 3 or more), we considered mean improvement in disability grade 4 weeks after randomization as the primary outcome measure. As secondary outcome measures, we considered the number of participants improved by one or more grades after 4 weeks, duration of ventilation, time needed to recover independent walking, death and residual disability and death. For patients who could still walk without aid (GBS disability grade 2 or less), we used time to the onset of motor recovery as the outcome, defined by improvement of at least two items of a muscle strength score or one item and improvement in cranial nerve function or trunk or respiratory involvement. We have also reported other relevant outcomes which had been selected as important in individual trials.
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Statistical analysis
We calculated a weighted treatment effect across trials using the Cochrane statistical package RevMan 4.2 with a fixed effect model when the results were homogeneous and a random effects model when they were not. Results were expressed as relative risks (RR) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for dichotomous outcomes and weighted mean difference (WMD) with 95% CIs for continuous outcomes. In two instances, the standard deviation of the change in disability grade after 4 weeks was not available and, to calculate the WMD of the improvement in disability grade, we imputed the largest values of the standard deviation for any of the other trials with that intervention (Bril et al., 1996
; Diener et al., 2001). Coefficients from logistic regression analyses, representing the odds ratio of relative recovery rates from different studies on a logarithmic scale, were combined using a weighted average with weights inversely proportional to their variances. This was achieved using the Generic Inverse Variance facility in RevMan. |
Results |
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Characteristics of trials included
We included eight trials comparing PE with supportive treatment or differing amounts of PE (Table 2). A ninth trial, mentioned in the table for completeness, could not be included in our analyses because the patients randomized to PE also received prednisone, whereas the control group received neither (Mendell et al., 1985
) (Table 2). Six trials had adequate randomization and allocation concealment but in two allocation was alternate (Osterman et al., 1984; Farkkila et al., 1987). None of the trials compared PE with sham exchange which was considered unethical in patients who were acutely ill. We included 10 trials comparing IVIg with supportive care, PE or immunoabsorption and one trial comparing IVIg 1.0 g/kg given over 2 days with IVIg 2.0 g/kg given over 5 days (Table 3). Eight trials had adequate randomization and allocation concealment but two used alternate or block sequential randomization (Gürses et al., 1995; Haupt et al., 1996) and one used randomization but had unclear allocation concealment (Wang et al., 2001). We included eight trials of corticosteroids (Table 4). Four had adequate concealment and randomization, one had adequate randomization but unclear allocation concealment (Shukla et al., 1988) and three had alternate allocation (García et al., 1985; Singh and Gupta, 1996; Bansal et al., 2004). Four small trials of other treatments have been mentioned in the discussion.
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Efficacy results
Plasma exchange
There was significantly more improvement in disability, the primary outcome in this review, after 4 weeks in the PE-treated participants than the untreated controls. For the 585 participants in the four trials with available data (Greenwood et al., 1984
; The Guillain-Barré Syndrome Study Group, 1985; French Cooperative Group in Plasma Exchange in Guillain-Barré Syndrome, 1987; French Cooperative Group on Plasma Exchange in Guillain-Barré Syndrome, 1997), the WMD in improvement was –0.89 of grade (95% CI –1.14 to –0.63) more improvement in those who received PE than those who did not, P < 0.00001 (Fig. 1A). Other secondary outcome measures including the relative rate of improving one disability grade, median time to recover independent walking and being dead or disabled after 1 year also significantly favoured the treated participants compared with those who only received supportive care (Tables 5 and 6). The relative rate of full muscle strength recovery was 1.24 (95% CI 1.07–1.45) times more with PE than without. The mortality was similar, 5%, in the treated and untreated arms of the studies (Table 5).
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One trial was confined to people with mild GBS, who were able to walk unaided at randomization (French Cooperative Group on Plasma Exchange in Guillain-Barré Syndrome, 1997
). Participants were randomized to receive either two sessions of PE in 3 days, or supportive care. The number of patients with one or more grades of improvement at 1 month was significantly greater, 26/45, in the treated group compared to the control group, 13/46 (RR 3.47, 95% CI 1.45–8.31, P < 0.001).
In most studies, the amount of PE was arbitrarily set at the equivalent of five single plasma volume exchanges undertaken over up to 2 weeks. The French studies used larger exchanges of 1.5 plasma volumes. Two trials have investigated the amount of PE. In one trial, patients who could not stand unaided and who did not need respiratory assistance were randomized to either two or four 1.5 plasma volume exchanges (French Cooperative Group on Plasma Exchange in Guillain-Barré Syndrome, 1997). Significantly more participants (93/155, 64%) treated with four PEs recovered full muscle strength after a year than those treated with two PEs (67/149, 48%), RR 1.35 (95% CI 1.09–1.67, P = 0.006). In a parallel trial, 161 ventilator-dependent GBS patients were randomized to receive either six PEs or four PEs. There was no significant difference between the two regimens in the same measure of recovery (French Cooperative Group on Plasma Exchange in Guillain-Barré Syndrome, 1997). In most studies, the replacement fluid has been a mixture of albumen and saline. In one study, 57 patients were randomly allocated to receive PE with albumen and gelatin as replacement fluids, and 52 received PE with fresh frozen plasma as the replacement fluid. There was no significant difference between the two groups in any measure of recovery (French Cooperative Group on Plasma Exchange in Guillain-Barré Syndrome, 1997).
Intravenous immunoglobulin
Only three trials have compared IVIg with no treatment or placebo and all concerned children. One trial allocated 18 children alternately to IVIg or supportive treatment alone (Gürses et al., 1995). After 4 weeks, seven of the nine patients in the IVIg group but only two of the nine untreated patients had recovered full strength. The other trial randomized children into three groups: dexamethasone alone in a dose of 5–10 mg daily for 5 or 6 days and then tailed over 7–10 days, or the same dose of dexamethasone and either IVIg or PE (Wang et al., 2001). This trial included 20 children treated with IVIg and corticosteroids and 16 with corticosteroids alone who could be used to investigate the efficacy of IVIg. The children who received IVIg recovered muscle strength significantly faster than those treated without. The third trial (Korinthenberg et al., 2005) was a randomized open study which compared IVIg in a dose of 1.0 g/kg (half the usual dose) with supportive treatment in 21 mildly affected children who could still walk unaided. The authors made available the detailed results from which we were able to compute the change in the disability grade scale used in this review after 4 weeks. The mean improvement in the IVIg group was significantly more than in the untreated participants (mean difference –1.42; 95% CI –2.57 to –0.27, P = 0.02). No meta-analysis was performed because this outcome used was not available for the other two trials.
Five trials including 582 participants compared IVIg with PE (Table 3) (van der Meché et al., 1992; Bril et al., 1996; Plasma Exchange/Sandoglobulin Guillain-Barré Syndrome Trial Group, 1997; Nomura et al., 2000; Diener et al., 2001). The weighted mean disability grade improvement was almost identical, being –0.02 more with IVIg than with PE (95% CI –0.25 more improvement to 0.20 less improvement) (Fig. 1B). There was also no significant difference between the treatments for any of the available outcome measures (Tables 5 and 6).
Immunoabsorption is an alternative to PE for removing plasma constituents. One trial with 41 participants found no difference in any outcome between those treated with IVIg and those treated with immunoabsorption (Diener et al., 2001).
Two trials compared different doses or regimens of IVIg. One, in adults, randomized 39 patients with GBS of any severity and contraindications for PE to 3 or 6 days of IVIg 0.4 g/kg (Raphaël et al., 2001). The mean improvement in disability grade after 4 weeks was greater in the 6- than the 3-day dose group but not significantly so, mean difference –0.5 (95% CI –1.26 to 0.26). There were no significant differences in the time to walk without assistance, duration of ventilation, adverse events or mortality. Full recovery of strength was non-significantly greater in the 6-day group (11 out of 16) compared with the 3-day group (6 out of 15), RR 1.72 (95% CI 0.85–3.47). The other, in 50 children, compared the standard regimen of 0.4 g/kg daily for 5 days with same total dose of 2.0 g/kg given as 1.0 g/kg daily for 2 days (Korinthenberg et al., 2005). There were no significant differences in the primary or secondary outcome measures reported by the authors (Table 3) except that early relapses were significantly more common after the 2-day (5/23) than the 5-day regimen (0/23, P = 0.049). There was no significant difference in the primary outcome measure for this review. The mean difference in change in disability grade after 4 weeks was –0.27 less improvement with the 2-day than the 5-day regimen but the 95% CIs were wide, –0.94 to 0.40, so that there is uncertainty about this conclusion.
Combination of PE or immunoabsorption with intravenous immunoglobulin
One trial compared PE alone with PE followed by IVIg (Plasma Exchange/Sandoglobulin Guillain-Barré Syndrome Trial Group, 1997). After 4 weeks the WMD in disability grade was not significant, being 0.20 (95% CI –0.14 to 0.54) of a grade more improvement in the 128 patients who received both treatments than in the 121 patients who received PE alone. There were also no significant differences in the secondary outcome measures: number improved after 4 weeks, time to independent walking, duration of ventilation, death or death and disability 12 months later (Tables 5 and 6).
One non-randomized trial compared immunoabsorption followed by IVIg in 24 patients with immunoabsorption alone in 13 patients. There was no significant difference in improvement after 4 weeks. The mean difference was 1.10, 95% CI 0.36–1.84, more improvement in the immunoabsorption followed by IVIg group than in the group treated with immunoabsorption alone (Haupt et al., 1996). There were also no significant differences in any other outcome.
Corticosteroids
Eight trials randomized altogether 623 participants to corticosteroids or placebo or supportive care (Table 4). Six trials with 587 participants had information about our primary outcome measure: there was no significant difference in the mean improvement in disability after 4 weeks between those who received corticosteroids and those who did not (Fig. 1C). The WMD of change in grade was –0.36 (95% CI –0.88 to 0.16), indicating less improvement in the corticosteroid-treated participants. There was significant heterogeneity in this analysis so that a random effects model was used for the computation. Inspection of the forest plot suggested more benefit from the intravenous regimens so that we undertook a separate analysis of the trials which used oral and intravenous regimens. In the four small trials which used oral corticosteroids (Shukla et al., 1988; Singh and Gupta, 1996; Bansal et al., 2004), there were in total 120 participants and there was significantly less improvement with corticosteroids than without, WMD –0.82 of a grade (95% CI –0.17 to –1.47, P < 0.0001). In the two large trials which used intravenous methylprednisolone (Guillain-Barré Syndrome Steroid Trial Group, 1993; Van Koningsveld et al., 2004), there were 467 participants and the change in grade was not significantly different in the corticosteroid from the placebo allocated participants, WMD –0.17 of a grade (95% CI 0.06 to –0.39) more improvement in the corticosteroid-treated patients.
When we analysed the number of patients who improved one or more disability grades after 4 weeks, information was only available for five trials with 567 participants. The same trends were observed but there was no significant heterogeneity and the differences were less significant. The relative rate of improving by one or more grades was 1.08 (95% CI 0.93–1.24) more in the corticosteroid treated than the control participants, a non-significant difference. In the three small oral corticosteroid trials there were 100 participants and the relative rate of improvement was less in the corticosteroid-treated participants but not significantly less, 0.8 (95% CI 0.5–1.16). When this analysis was confined to the two large trials which used intravenous methylprednisolone, the relative rate of improvement did not quite achieve significance, being 1.14 (95% CI 0.97–1.34) of a grade more in the corticosteroid-treated patients. The effects of two known important prognostic variables, age (less than 50 years and 50 years or more) and initial disability, on the relative rate of improving one or more grades in 4 weeks, were tested using logistic regression and an inverse variance weighted meta-analysis for these two trials. The result gave an adjusted log odds ratio of 1.41 (95% CI 0.95–2.07, P = 0.08) which was in favour of corticosteroids but not quite significant. Assuming that in the controls the probability of recovering one or more grades is the average of those observed in the two studies, i.e. 53.2%, then these adjusted log odds ratio results are equivalent to a RR of 1.16 (95% CI 0.98–1.32, P = 0.08) for improving one or more grades comparing corticosteroids with placebo.
In the two intravenous methylprednisolone trials the median time from randomization to discontinuation of ventilation ranged from 18 to 30 days in those treated with corticosteroids and 26 to 27 days in the placebo group (Guillain-Barré Syndrome Steroid Trial Group, 1993; Van Koningsveld et al., 2004).
The median time to regain independent walking and relative risks of death or death and disability after a year were not significantly different in the corticosteroid and the control subjects (Tables 5 and 6).
Relapses
Relapses occurred in 13/321 PE-treated participants and only 4/328 of those who did not receive PE, a significant difference, RR 2.89 (95% CI 1.05–7.93, P = 0.04). There were no significant differences in the frequency of relapses in PE-treated compared with IVIg-treated or in corticosteroid-treated compared with control subjects (Table 5).
Safety results
In three trials with altogether 556 participants comparing PE with supportive care, details of complications were available. The RRs of serious adverse events (severe infections, blood pressure instability, pulmonary embolus or cardiac arrhythmias) were not significantly greater in the treated than the untreated participants. In the trial that compared albumen and gelatin with fresh frozen plasma as the replacement fluid there were adverse events in 46% of 135 sessions using fresh frozen plasma and 32% of 208 sessions using albumen (RR 1.40, 95% CI 0.86–2.26). In three trials with 347 participants comparing PE with IVIg (Plasma Exchange/Sandoglobulin Guillain-Barré Syndrome Trial Group, 1997; Nomura et al., 2000; Diener et al., 2001), the number of patients with adverse events was not significantly different between the treatments (RR 0.84, 95% CI 0.45–1.59, less in the IVIg-treated patients). In one of the large trials (van der Meché et al., 1992), significantly less patients treated with IVIg had multiple complications than with PE: only 5 of 74 IVIg had multiple complications compared with 16 of 73 PE patients, RR 0.31, 95% CI 0.12–0.80.
Subgroups
Limited information was available about the relative merits of the treatments in different subgroups of patients. Patients requiring ventilation have a worse prognosis. Three trials of PE described the outcome of a total of 198 participants who were ventilated at randomization (The Guillain-Barré Syndrome Study Group, 1985; Farkkila et al., 1987; French Cooperative Group in Plasma Exchange in Guillain-Barré Syndrome, 1987). The outcomes were better in the PE treated than the untreated patients, significantly so in two of the trials, but the measures reported did not permit meta-analysis. For patients randomized early, within 7 days, the two trials of PE reporting the appropriate information found significantly better outcomes for those receiving PE. Outcomes were also better with PE and for those treated between 7 and 14 (French Cooperative Group in Plasma Exchange in Guillain-Barré Syndrome, 1987) or 28 days (The Guillain-Barré Syndrome Study Group, 1985) after onset compared with those treated later. Older age is an adverse prognostic factor but age did not have a significant influence on the treatment effect in either of the large trials comparing IVIg with PE. There was also no influence of the presence or absence of sensory deficit on the response to treatment in either of those trials. The occurrence of a previous diarrhoeal illness had been a significant adverse prognostic factor in some series. The effect of a previous diarrhoeal illness had opposite interactions with treatment in the two large trials that provided this information: patients with previous diarrhoea had significantly more improvement in disability grade after 4 weeks when treated with IVIg than with PE in one trial (van der Meché et al., 1992) and with PE than with IVIg in the other (Plasma Exchange/Sandoglobulin Guillain-Barré Syndrome Trial Group, 1997).
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Discussion |
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This synthesis of the results of all the randomized trials confirms that PE hastens recovery and shows that it also improves the outcome at 1 year without a significant effect on mortality or increase in adverse events. Although the outcomes of the PE trials were not conducted in a blinded fashion, the reported benefits were large and considered robust. The evidence from randomized trials comparing IVIg with no treatment is inadequate. However, the synthesis of the evidence shows that IVIg and PE have similar effects and the confidence limits are so narrow that an important clinical difference is unlikely to have been missed. One trial found no significant difference between the combination of PE followed by IVIg with either treatment alone but the sample sizes were not large enough to rule out a small beneficial effect of the combination treatment. Oral corticosteroids given for two or more weeks significantly slowed recovery. When the results of two trials were synthesized intravenous methylprednisolone did not produce significant long- or short-term benefit. When a correction for prognostic factors was taken into account, a minor synergistic effect on short-term outcome of IVIg combined with intravenous methylprednisolone could not be excluded (Van Koningsveld et al., 2004
). The explanation for the lack of more obvious benefits from corticosteroids is unclear but they might have harmful effects on denervated muscle or inhibit macrophage repair processes.
Only limited information is available concerning dosage. The standard dose of PE used in the American and PSGBS trials was the equivalent of five plasma volumes. The French trials used one and a half plasma volume exchanges and showed that four such exchanges were superior to two for moderately affected patients, while six were no better than four for ventilated patients (French Cooperative Group on Plasma Exchange in Guillain-Barré Syndrome, 1997). The usual IVIg regimen is 0.4 g/kg for 5 days. In a French trial, 3 days of 0.4 g/kg daily was slightly, but not significantly, less effective than 6 days (Raphaël et al., 2001). A 5-day course of intravenous methylprednisolone showed a trend towards more rapid recovery, whereas oral corticosteroids for four or more weeks delayed recovery (Fig. 1C).
Minor side-effects from IVIg occur commonly but serious adverse events such as stroke and renal failure are rare: its main disadvantages are expense and theoretical risk of transmission of infection by viruses, prions or other agents (Dalakas and Clark, 2003; Dalakas, 2004). In experienced centres adverse events occur in 4% of PE procedures and serious adverse events, usually complications of central venous catheter insertion, are rare (Kiprov et al., 2001). Since PE is less available, less convenient and less comfortable for the patient, IVIg is the usual treatment of choice in many centres. Although long-term treatment with corticosteroids causes numerous serious side-effects (Bromberg and Carter, 2004), short-term treatment did not result in more serious adverse events than supportive treatment or placebo in the trials reviewed here. In both trials of intravenous methylprednisolone, there was a highly significant, but unexplained, reduction in the occurrence of hypertension.
Independent adverse prognostic factors in each of two large trials were previous diarrhoea, older age, disease severity and rapid disease onset (van der Meché et al., 1992) (Plasma Exchange/Sandoglobulin Guillain-Barré Syndrome Trial Group, 1997). In neither trial did multivariate analysis show a significant interaction with treatment, except for diarrhoea which was associated with a better response to IVIg in one (van der Meché et al., 1992) and to PE in the other (Plasma Exchange/Sandoglobulin Guillain-Barré Syndrome Trial Group, 1997). Unfortunately neither these nor other randomized trials included sufficient participants with axonal forms of GBS to permit conclusions about whether they respond differently to treatment than people with AIDP. In children, who have a better prognosis than adults, the available trial evidence is not of primary quality but consistently points to a beneficial effect of IVIg, which is supported by a good quality observational study (Kanra et al., 1997). A randomized study compared 20 children who received IVIg with 18 who received PE (Wang et al., 2001). Both groups received dexamethasone. The children who received IVIg recovered bulbar or respiratory function, or made a two-grade improvement in muscle strength, in a mean (SD) of 17 (6 days) compared with 30 (7 days) in the PE group (P < 0.0001). In retrospective studies, patients with antibodies to ganglioside GM1 or GM1b treated with IVIg recovered faster than those treated with PE (Jacobs et al., 1996; Yuki et al., 2000; Kuwabara et al., 2001).
The only other acute immunotherapy treatments tested in randomized trials have been the Chinese medicine herbal medicine tripterygium polyglycoside compared with dexamethasone (Zhang et al., 2000), cerebrospinal fluid filtration compared with PE (Table 2) (Wollinsky et al., 2001) and, as treatments in addition to IVIg, brain derived neurotrophic factor (Bensa et al., 2000) or beta-interferon (Bensa et al., 2000; Pritchard et al., 2003) compared with placebo. None of these trials were large enough to detect even moderate treatment effects.
It has been possible to synthesize the results of studies performed over 30 years because the diagnostic criteria are clinical and reasonably robust and because most studies and all the large ones used or could provide results measured with the GBS disability scale (Table 1). This scale has the virtues of simplicity, face validity and reproducibility but it is non-linear and its large steps may be insufficiently sensitive to detect some clinically meaningful differences (Kleyweg et al., 1991). The disease is heterogeneous and the speed and extent of recovery are variable. We chose change in the GBS disability scale after 4 weeks as being the most powerful statistical test, arguing that changes in the scale were sufficiently normally distributed to justify the assumptions of parametric tests. Even so, in order to detect statistically significant differences in short-term outcomes with this scale, sample sizes of about 120 patients in each of two groups are necessary to detect differences with a power of 80% at the 5% significance level (Plasma Exchange/Sandoglobulin Guillain-Barré Syndrome Trial Group, 1997).
In the randomized trials neither PE nor IVIg improved mortality, which ranged from 2.4% to 6.3% (Table 5). Since the introduction of these treatments, the mortality in hospital and population-based studies has not changed, ranging from 5% to 15% (Hughes and Cornblath, 2005). The greater mortality in the observational studies than in the trials might reflect the exclusion of patients with co-morbidity from the trials, more effective intensive care facilities in specialist centres or other factors.
Death or severe residual disability in the trials ranged between 9 and 17% despite a 6% risk reduction with PE (Table 5). The comparisons of IVIg and PE showed no difference in long-term outcome. Lesser degrees of disability and fatigue are common in survivors. The persistent mortality and residual symptoms in the survivors emphasize the need for continued efforts to design new treatments. Other areas of uncertainty needing more research are the identification of patients at greatest risk of a poor outcome, the long-term effects of initial immunotherapy and clarification of the value of IVIg in adults with mild disease, Fisher syndrome, axonal forms and other conditions related to GBS. Information is also lacking about how to treat patients who worsen or fail to improve after being treated with IVIg or PE. It is common practice to treat patients who improve and then relapse with IVIg or PE again. Some centres treat patients again if they fail to improve after about 2 or 3 weeks but evidence is needed to test the effectiveness of this practice. Advances in understanding the immunopathogenesis of GBS should eventually lead to the design of novel treatments which will enhance recovery or remyelination and regeneration.
This systematic review not only confirms that PE hastens recovery from GBS and improves its long-term outcome in severely affected adult patients, but also provides the best quantitative estimates of these effects. In adult patients, the effect of IVIg is equivalent. Because of its greater convenience and availability, IVIg is, appropriately, usually used. Following PE with IVIg did not produce significant extra benefit. In mildly affected patients, PE may be beneficial but there is no direct evidence about the efficacy of IVIg. By collecting evidence from several small trials, this review was able to draw conclusions which could not have been drawn from individual trials. Thus, three trials in children consistently showed a beneficial effect from IVIg compared with supportive care alone. Similarly, meta-analysis of the evidence from all the available trials showed that oral corticosteroids significantly slowed recovery, whereas intravenous methylprednisolone alone did not produce significant long- or short-term benefit. Despite these treatments, between 9% and 17% of patients in these trials died or remained severely disabled. No other treatments have been adequately tested and improved therapeutic strategies are urgently needed.
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Acknowledgements |
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We thank Kate Jewitt, Cochrane Neuromuscular Disease Group Co-ordinator, for help. Financial support came from the United Kingdom Department of Health, Guy's and St Thomas’ Charity and the European Neuromuscular Centre.
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References |
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