Nexium® was shown to achieve significantly (p=0.0001) greater healing of esophagitis than lansoprazole.  [1] More importantly, Nexium® produced significantly higher healing rates for all patients with esophagitis, even those with more severe damage. In contrast, the efficacy of lansoprazole tended to decline to a greater degree with increasing severity of esophagitis.

Approximately one third of the 21 million Americans and 50 million Europeans with gastroesophageal reflux disease will experience damage to the esophagus caused by frequent reflux of gastric acid and will require PPI therapy to resolve heartburn and allow healing.  [2] These study results suggest that if all patients with esophagitis were treated with Nexium®, instead of lansoprazole, an additional 239,000 American and 580,000 European patients could be healed within one treatment period, eliminating the cost of further physician consultation time, follow-up investigation and repeat PPI therapy.

“We’ve already captured 13.3 per cent of the weekly new prescriptions PPI market share in the USA, after just seven months, and 6 per cent of the total PPI cash market in the European early launch countries. We’ve now been able to show the full picture of Nexium’s® efficacy and I’m confident that Nexium’s® market share will rise on the back of these highly positive results,” commented Dr Martin Nicklasson, Executive Vice President GI Franchise, AstraZeneca.

The study results were generated by a multi-centre, randomised, double blind trial, involving 5241 adult patients diagnosed by endoscopy with erosive esophagitis. Patients received either Nexium® 40mg or lansoprazole 30mg, once daily, for eight weeks. Nexium® was more effective than lansoprazole for healing of erosive esophagitis over the eight week treatment (p=<0.0001). By the end of the trial, an additional 100 patients were healed with Nexium®, as compared to lansoprazole. Nexium® also provided greater and faster resolution of heartburn, the primary symptom of erosive esophagitis.

“We’re very pleased with the results, but once we’d seen Nexium® outshine Losec®, we were confident of Nexium’s® clinical success against any other PPI therapy,” added Dr Nicklasson.

“We know from the pH studies that Nexium® controls acid more effectively than all other PPIs, so it is not unrealistic to expect Nexium® to be more effective in healing esophageal damage than other PPIs,” explains Professor Peter Kahrilas, a trial investigator from Northwestern University Medical School, Chicago, USA. “Nexium® is a logical first-line treatment for all patients with esophagitis,” Professor Kahrilas concluded.