Effectiveness of neutralizing antibody cocktail in hemodialysis patients: a case series of 20 patients treated with or without REGN-COV2

Abstract

The number of patients with SARS-CoV-2 infection continues to increase, and it has become a global pandemic. Although there is an urgent need to establish an effective treatment, the medication available for dialysis patients has been limited. An antibody cocktail containing two SARS-CoV-2-neutrarizing antibodies, REGN-COV2 has been granted special approval for COVID-19 in Japan, since July 2021, and this intravenous preparation can be used for dialysis patients. At our hospital, we had 22 hemodialysis patients with COVID-19, and five of them were treated with REGN-COV2. On admission, four of the five patients had moderate disease (pneumonia but O2 inhalation) and one patient had mild disease (not having pneumonia). The mean duration of hospitalization treated with REGN-COV2 was 10.2 ± 2.86 days (mean ± SD), which was less than half, compared to patients untreated of similar severity on admission (22.12 ± 15.5). The time to fever resolution was average 7 days, and no cases progressed to severe illness or death. Among these patients, no obvious adverse reactions were shown. Although more studies with a larger number of patients could be needed for a rigorous evaluation of the effect, our result suggests that REGN-COV2 may be safe and having the possibilities in preventing severe disease in hemodialysis patients. Given the difficulty in securing inpatient beds tend to be in short supply, the strategy combined with neutralizing antibody could be beneficial for end-stage kidney disease (ESKD) patients with hemodialysis who are at high risk of severe disease.