Can omalizumab be used effectively to treat severe conjunctivitis in children with asthma? A case example and review of the literature

A 14-year-old girl with poorly controlled asthma attended the difficult-to-treat asthma clinic for review. Although she has eosinophilia and significantly raised immunoglobulin E levels, she is not currently a candidate for omalizumab (Xolair). She also suffers from chronic urticaria, eosinophilic eosophagitis and severe conjunctivitis. You wonder if omalizumab would be effective in treating her multiple atopic conditions, in particular her troublesome conjunctivitis. PubMed was searched using the following search terms: (Omalizumab) or (Xolair) and (conjunctivitis). Searches were conducted in November 2020. Abstracts were selected for full text review if the study population identified asthma as a comorbidity. Non-paediatric studies and those that were not written in English were excluded. The use of omalizumab has the potential to be effective in the treatment of conjunctivitis associated with asthma and other atopic conditions. However, research is needed to address the question, in the form of multicenter, double-blind randomized control trials.