Conditions: Cystic Fibrosis
Allocation: NA | Intervention model: SINGLE_GROUP
Enrollment: 8
Healthy volunteers: yes

Brief summary:
Clinical studies of lumacaftor + ivacaftor (combo therapy) produced better FEV1 (forced expiratory volume in 1 second) improvements than ivacaftor alone, without further improvement in sweat chloride results.

To help understand why sweat chloride was unresponsive, the investigators will use a newly developed sweat secretion test that provides accurate, in vivo readout of CFTR (cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator) function in the sweat gland secretory coil.

The investigators devised a protocol to determine if short courses of ivacaftor (3.5 days) will produce significant increases in WT (Wild-Type, i.e. normal) CFTR open probability by measuring CFTR-dependent sweating (C-sweat) in subjects with WT CFTR.

Detailed description:
Cystic fibrosis (CF) is a genetic disease caused by malfunctioning of a protein called CFTR.

CF affects various organs including the sweat glands and the lungs. An FDA approved drug called ivacaftor helps some people with CF, and laboratory tests show that it produces further improvement when combined with an investigational drug called lumacaftor. However, results from clinical tests of the two drugs used together gave mixed results: lung function improved but sweat gland function did not improve. This study will measure CFTR-dependent sweat rate to test the hypothesis that CFTR in the normal sweat glands might be functioning at peak efficiency, and so can't be improved further with ivacaftor, thus accounting for the apparent discrepancy between lung function and sweat gland results. CFTR-dependent sweat rate is important to understanding CF because it is a very accurate measure of CFTR function.

Arms:
arm 1: Participants will receive ivacaftor orally for 3 days, followed by 35 days off drug. Participants will repeat this cycle then receive ivacaftor for 3 additional days. For sweat testing, participants will receive β-adrenergic cocktail to stimulated sweating, at both 1% stimulation strength and full stimulation strength. Each participant will also receive pilocarpine nitrate 5% administered by Macroduct sweat stimulator device. Sweat stimulation testing will be done on- and off-ivacaftor.

Interventions: intervention 1: Ivacaftor intervention 2: β-Adrenergic cocktail intervention 3: Pilocarpine Nitrate 5% intervention 4: Macroduct sweat stimulator
Intervention descriptions: intervention 1: 150mg administered orally twice daily. intervention 2: Administered subcutaneously to induce sweating. Cocktail composed of atropine (280µM), isoproterenol (160µM), and aminophylline (20 mM). intervention 3: Administered subcutaneously using Macroduct sweat stimulator device. intervention 4: None

Protocol document: