Airway-Rehydrating Agents for the Treatment of Cystic Fibrosis: Past, Present, and Future

ObjectiveTo review and evaluate airway-rehydrating agents used for the treatment of cystic fibrosis (CF).Data Sources:Literature was retrieved through MEDLINE (1977-August 2010), Cochrane Library, and International Pharmaceutical Abstracts (1977-August 2010). Search terms used included hypertonic saline, inhaled mannitol, denufosol, Moli 1901, lancovutide, and cystic fibrosis. Reference citations from selected articles were reviewed.Study Selection And Data Extraction:All articles published in English identified from the data sources were evaluated for inclusion. Clinical trials in humans and relevant review articles were evaluated for each airway-rehydrating agent,Data Synthesis:Use of airway-rehydrating agents for the treatment of CF is an expanding area. Hypertonic saline (7% NaCl) is currently the only commercially available airway-rehydrating agent recommended for chronic therapy in patients with CF and is being evaluated in younger patients. Inhaled mannitol is an investigational dry-powder inhalati...