Administration of agents for the treatment of inflammation
A method of chronically reducing a patient's pathological inflammation via the administration of an agent that specifically binds to an alpha-4 integrin or a dimer comprising an alpha-4 integrin is disclosed. The agent provided must have a binding affinity such that administration is sufficient to suppress pathological inflammation, and the agent is administered chronically to provide long-term suppression of pathological inflammation.
1. A method of monitoring a chronic administration regimen for treating pathological inflammation in a subject, wherein the pathological inflammation is modulated by an alpha-4 integrin, comprising chronically administering 300 mg natalizumab or an immunologically active fragment thereof by infusion every four weeks to the patient for a period of at least six months; and detecting levels of brain lesions using an imaging technique.
2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the pathological inflammation is caused by multiple sclerosis.
3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the method comprises chronically administering 300 mg natalizumab.
4. The method of claim 3 , wherein the imaging technique is magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).
5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the pathological inflammation is caused by multiple sclerosis.
6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the method comprises detecting presence or absence of new lesions in the central nervous system using MRI.
7. The method of claim 5 , wherein the method comprises detecting Gd-enhancing brain lesions.