NCT03098225

A Trial to Evaluate the Efficacy of Orbital Radiotherapy in Graves' Orbitopathy

A Phase IV, Randomized, Multi-center Clinical Trial to Compare the Efficacy of Orbital Radiotherapy in Association With Intravenous Glucocorticoids vs Intravenous Glucocorticoids Alone for Moderately Severe and Active Graves' Orbitopathy

• Status: Not Yet Recruiting
• Phase: Phase 4
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 120 (estimated)
• Sponsor: University of Pisa · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 35 Years – 75 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

Graves' orbitopathy (GO) is a disfiguring and disabling disease that profoundly impairs the quality of life of affected patients. High dose intravenous (iv) glucocorticoids (GC) (ivGC) is a well established, widely used treatment for active GO. The use of systemic glucocorticoids takes advantage from their immune suppressive and antiinflammatory actions, resulting in an overall beneficial effect ranging from \~35 to \~60% of patients in various studies. The intravenous route of administration has been shown to be superior to the oral route, both in terms of GO outcome and side effect profile. The combination of ivGC and orbital radiotherapy (OR) is used routinely in patients with moderate-severe, active GO, as a second-line treatment, as also recommended in the recent Guidelines published by the European Thyroid Association/European Group on Graves' Orbitopathy. Thus, the majority of studies have shown that OR increases the response rate to GC. Those studies were performed using oral GC, whereas it is not known whether OR potentiate also the effects of ivGC. The present study is aimed at determining whether OR potentiate the effects of ivGC in the treatment of moderately severe and active GO, in terms of GO outcome and quality of life. A possible extension of the study can be foreseen, aimed at investigating the very long time GO outcome.

Conditions

• Thyroid Associated Ophthalmopathy

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
RADIATION	Orbital radiotherapy	A high-voltage linear accelerator will be used and a cumulative radiation dose of 20 Gy will be delivered to each eye in 10 fractionated doses over a period of 2 weeks. All patients will be treated in both eyes.
DRUG	Methylprednisolone	Methylprednisolone pulse therapy for 12 weeks as follows: 500 mg IV once weekly for 6 weeks, then 250 mg IV once weekly for a further 6 weeks. Cumulative dose 4.5 g.

Timeline

• Start date: 2024-01-01
• Primary completion: 2026-03-31
• Completion: 2027-03-31
• First posted: 2017-03-31
• Last updated: 2023-03-15