Plasmodium falciparum clearance in clinical studies of artesunate-amodiaquine and comparator treatments in sub-Saharan Africa, 1999–2009

Delayed Plasmodium falciparum response to artemisinin is reported in Southeast Asia, and may spread to other, more intensely malaria-endemic areas. Artemisinin compounds contribute rapid parasite killing and faster clearance to artemisinin-containing combination therapy (ACT). Artemisinin tolerance/resistance manifests itself with slower parasite clearance, while ACT remain generally effective both clinically and parasitologically [1‐4]. Genomic studies are underway, which have generated so far two sets of putative markers of artemisinin resistance - K13-propeller polymorphism [5], and a SNP in the gene encoding a DNA repair protein RAD5 on chromosome 13 (and possibly also on chromosome 10) [6]. An in vitro assay (Ring Stage Assay) has also focused on the very early phases of the ring-stage parasite [7]. However, as of today, in the clinic as well as in the field the parasite clearance time (PCT) and its related clinical phenotype (delayed PCT) remain the best practical surrogates of artemisinin in vivo resistance [8]; the problem is that the frequent sampling (every six or eight hours) required to measure PCT accurately and to estimate the parasite clearance half-life [9] is practically difficult even in research settings. Easier methods are needed for both research and routine purposes. For example, failure to clear by Day 3 (72 hours post-treatment start) is proposed as a simple and accurate predictor of treatment failure [10], requiring a single time-point and thus limiting the workload in resource-limited settings.

Applying these and other measures both retrospectively and prospectively to commonly-used ACT will help understand trends and detect changes early enough to prompt effective responses to contain the spread of resistance. Artesunate-amodiaquine (ASAQ) is the second most commonly used ACT in the world (the first-line treatment in 22 out of 44 sub-Saharan African countries); more than 200 million treatments of ASAQ Winthrop have been distributed in Africa since the medication became available in 2007 [11‐13]. While ASAQ is generally effective, the decreasing efficacy of AQ single-agent treatment have been reported in some sub-Saharan African settings [14, 15]. Should artemisinin resistance occur there, it is expected to result soon in treatment failures, particularly in subjects with partial immunity, such as children in high-transmission areas, or patients of all ages in low-transmission areas. Monitoring ASAQ efficacy, particularly in these groups, has therefore become all the more important.

Greater understanding of factors influencing parasite clearance is crucial, and requires the analysis of pooled data from individual patient records. Therefore, this study collected and analysed a large sample (over 15,000 patients) of individual patient data (of whom approximately three-quarters were children under six years of age) from clinical trials conducted in sub-Saharan Africa between 1999 and 2009.

Studies such as this will help provide the foundations for further analyses of parasite clearance trends across sub-Saharan malaria-endemic countries.

Overall 15,017 patients treated for uncomplicated P. falciparum malaria at 44 sites in 20 sub-Saharan African countries were included in the analysis (Figure 1). The proportion of patients treated with ASAQ was 51% (n = 7,660) vs 49% (n = 7,357) on comparator treatments; 31% (4,848/15,017) of the patients had complete parasitaemia data every 24 hours up to Day 3 and then Day 7 (2,355 in ASAQ and 3,493 in comparator groups). Overall, the proportion of children under six years of age was 77%, and the overall geometric mean parasitaemia pre-treatment was 16,964/μL (Table 2).

This individual patient data analysis of parasite clearance was conducted on a large sample (n ~15,000) of uncomplicated malaria treatments (predominantly paediatric; three-quarters less than six years old) from 44 sites and 20 sub-Saharan African countries with different levels of endemicity, covering the decade 1999–2009.

These results confirm the correlation between pre-treatment parasitaemia and PCT [10], and offer an easy way to calculate the typical PCT (in hour) using parasitaemia before treatment (p0) with ASAQ or other equivalent treatments (pPCT = 3.614*ln(p0) – 6.135, r² = 0.94). There was also a (weaker) correlation between parasitaemia before treatment and the parasite reduction ratio (PRR) at 24 h.

Monitoring treatment response and detecting artemisinin resistance as early as possible have become a major issue in malaria control. The rate at which treatment clears parasites within the first few days is at present the most useful practical test for ACT, as early response to treatment relies predominantly on the parasite response to artemisinin, independent of whether parasites are later cleared for good through the combination of the longer-lived companion drug and the host’s immune response.

The present analysis focused on initial response to ACT treatment, as a proxy for artemisinin resistance and failure, and aimed to identify variables that were independently associated with persistent parasitaemia on Days 2 and 3 in settings where artemisinin resistance has probably not yet emerged.

Within the period covered by these studies, there was no indication of delayed response to ACT. ACT cleared parasites rapidly leaving very few patients with a low parasitaemia on Day 3 (first day after the completion of the three-day ACT regimen). In particular, with ASAQ the parasite reduction ratio was 93.9% by Day 1 and 99.9% by Day 2; only 1.5% of the patients were still positive on Day 3 (against a proposed threshold of 3% indicating delayed response [10]). These data confirm that pre-treatment parasitaemia is a risk factor for failing to clear parasites on Day 2 and 3. They also show a clear contribution of artemisinins to the speed of action: ACT performed significantly better than non-ACT (whether combinations or single-agent treatments); no difference was detected between ACT (whether the artemisinin derivative was artesunate, artemether or dihydroartemisinin).

Consistently with previous results [10] and the first-order process of parasite clearance, there was a logarithmic correlation between patients’ pre-treatment parasitaemia and their pPCT; while developed using ASAQ data, it was applied satisfactorily to other ACT within this database as well as other studies. For example, in a study conducted in Mali [42] where parasitaemia was tested with frequent screenings (every eight hours) in patients treated for uncomplicated P. falciparum with artesunate for seven days and where there was no evidence of delayed parasitaemia, the median parasitaemia at enrolment (P0) was 27,070 μL and the observed median time of parasite clearance was 32 hours. Applying the suggested method using the logarithmic correlation found in the present paper (pPCT = 3.614*ln(P0) – 6.135) gave very similar results (30.8 hours with intervals of 26.8 to 37.3 hours).

This simple method was tested to predict a “typical” PCT in situations when resistance has not emerged. However, this estimation of the predicted time to parasite clearance is not without its limitations. The calculations may lack precision with studies sampling once a day and at variable intervals from treatment intake (as it might be the case for most clinical trials, especially on the first day). It has been suggested that parasite clearance rate can only be accurately estimated if sampling is at least every six hours [43]; it is thus possible that data could have been “over-analysed” in generating predicted time of parasite clearance in this case. Although parasite clearance half-life is the research reference to define slow parasite clearance, sampling patients four times or even twice a day is not feasible in routine monitoring, and might be cumbersome even in research settings. Detecting the first signs of artemisinin resistance in uncomplicated P. falciparum will likely require a combination of more sophisticated studies and routine monitoring. Between parasite clearance estimators [9] and Day 3 persistency [10], simple estimations of PCT based on daily sampling may add elements to facilitate comparisons and detection of trends. It would be useful to compare methods for validation, including databases with delayed responses.