The therapeutic approach to a patient with AAE should first be aimed to avoid fatalities due to angioedema and then to avoid the disability caused be angioedema recurrences. Angioedema- related fatalities derive from laryngeal edema. Based on the efficacy of replacement therapy with plasma-derived C1-INH in reverting laryngeal edema in patients with HAE [
35], the same approach has been used for AAE. This treatment works in the majority but not in all AAE patients and in our experience some patient with AAE become progressively non responsive to plasma-derived C1-INH or need increased doses [
5]. No other treatment for angioedema attacks has been extensively used in patients with AAE and therefore there is no established therapeutic alternative to plasma- derived C1-INH for life-threatening attacks. Non-responsive patients have just been assisted with invasive procedures aimed to maintain patency of upper airways during emergency. In recent years in a few AAE patients we have used two of the new treatments that have been proposed for HAE acute attacks: the kallikrein inhibitor ecallantide and the bradykinin B2 antagonist icatibant [
36]. Since refractoriness to plasma-derived C1-INH is due to its autoantibody-mediated rapid catabolism, the use of drugs different from C1-INH but active in reversing HAE attacks have very good rationale for being effective in AAE. In fact from our limited experience response is extremely favourable. We treated 2 facial attacks in two patients with ecallantide and 1 laryngeal and 3 facial attacks in another patient with icatibant. Two of these patients were completely, and one partially, non-responsive to plasma derived C1-INH. All treated attacks responded very rapidly either to ecallantide or icatibant. The critical condition of C1-INH non-responder patients and the absence of licensed drugs strongly indicate the need for off-label treatments. Therefore, we recommend all our AAE patients always have 3000 U of plasma-derived C1-INH immediately available and treat attacks with 1500 U and repeating if ineffective. In the event of laryngeal edema, resuscitation facilities should be available. For those patients who have slow or no response, ecallantide or icatibant should be provided.
Reducing disability related to angioedema recurrences can be obtained by shortening attacks with an on-demand treatment with plasma-derived C1-INH, by preventing attacks with long term prevention with antifibrinolytics or androgens, or by curing the associated disease. The latter is the first choice when the associated disease has
per se an indication to be treated. Resolution of the associated disease results in variable degrees of resolution of AAE from symptomatic improvement to complete biochemical and clinical recovery [
13‐
15]. Treatment of the associated disease aimed only to control angioedema symptoms requires careful risk/benefit evaluation. Since most of the time the associated disease is lymphoproliferative, the choice to start a patient on chemotherapy or immunosuppressant is not always straightforward. Long-term treatment to prevent angioedema symptoms is often used in HAE and has also been used in AAE. While in HAE androgen derivatives are very effective prophylactic agents, results may not be as good in AAE. The reason for this is not totally clear. We know that attenuated androgens can increase the plasma levels of C1-INH [
37]. Even if effective androgen doses in HAE do not require a measurable increase of C1-INH in plasma, it is still possible that these drugs relay on C1-INH production and their efficacy is less when C1-INH catabolism is very rapid [
38]. In contrast, antifibrinolytic agents, the other class of drugs used for symptom prophylaxis in HAE [
39,
40], seem to have better efficacy in AAE than in HAE. It is assumed that the effect of these drugs in C1-INH deficient patients works through their anti-plasmin activity. Plasmin is critical for angioedema symptoms in C1-INH deficiency although the role is not clearly defined [
41]. In AAE patients, the instability of the systems controlled by C1-INH is higher than in HAE and active plasmin is also generated separate from angioedema symptoms reinforcing the rationale for efficacy of antifibrinolytics in this condition [
42‐
45]. At present, we consider antifibrinolytic agents as the first choice drug for angioedema prophylaxis in AAE. Prevention of attacks with continuous infusions of plasma-derived C1-INH has been attempted with controversial results and in our opinion having very little rationale [
46,
47]. The half life of plasma- derived C1-INH in HAE indicates two infusions per week as the minimum to maintain protective prophylactic plasma levels [
48]. Even if one assumes that AAE patients will not require a more intensive program because of the faster C1-INH catabolism and will not increase the risk of becoming resistant to plasma-derived C1-INH, this prophylactic infusion regimen seems justified only for those patients with two or more severe attacks per week, a condition that we did not find in any of our 42 AAE patients. We reserve plasma-derived C1-INH infusions for on-demand treatment of severe angioedema events and do not use this for prophylaxis.