NEW DELHI: Two Covid positive senior citizens with cardiac complications admitted at a private healthcare facility here have been administered monoclonal antibody therapy which is said to reduce the chance of hospitalisation by 70 per cent in patients with mild to moderate symptoms, the hospital said on Thursday.
Sunirmal Ghatak (70) and Suresh Kumar Trehan (65) were on Tuesday administered a cocktail of Casirivimab and Imdevimab at BLK-Max Super Speciality Hospital as part of this single-dose infusion-based treatment.
Ghatak, with a known cardiac problem, had undergone angioplasty with stenting in the past, the hospital said in a statement.
Trehan reported to the hospital two days ago with severe breathlessness and was unable to lie down.
He had no previous history of any ailment.
His echocardiography showed strained heart with an ejection fraction of only 25 per cent, it said in a statement.
Both of them had oxygen saturation level above 95 per cent and came to the hospital within three days of developing COVID-19 symptoms.
The hospital successfully administered monoclonal antibody cocktail therapy to two of these Covid positive extremely high-risk senior citizen patients on Tuesday saving them from developing severe complications, it said.
This was the first time that monoclonal antibody cocktail therapy was administered at the hospital.
"Monoclonal antibodies are identical copies of an antibody that targets one specific antigen.
This treatment has previously been used to cure infections such as Ebola and HIV.
"According to studies, this 'Antibody Cocktail Treatment' for COVID-19 can prevent escalation of mild and moderate illness to severe which then requires hospitalisation in 70 per cent of the cases," said Dr Sandeep Nayar, Senior Director, BLK-Max Centre for Chest and Respiratory Diseases.
The therapy is most suited for "high-risk COVID-19 patients" within the first 10 days of onset of symptoms and meet any of the listed criteria such as age being 65 years or above.
The other criteria include obesity with a body mass index of more than 35, type one or type two diabetes mellitus, chronic kidney disease including those on dialysis, chronic liver disease, currently receiving immunosuppressive treatment, or if aged above 55 with either heart disease or hypertension or chronic lung disease.