Patients who suffer from autoimmune disease accept chronic management of symptoms through nonspecific immunosuppressant as the standard of treatment. These treatments along with medications ranging from cyclophosphamide to biologic therapies are associated with an increased risk for infections as well as significant adverse effects including hepatotoxicity, gastrointestinal perforation, and fatigue.

 

An optimal treatment strategy for autoimmune disease would specifically target disease associated antigens and limit systemic side effects. Many recent approaches have focused on the development of curative, antigen specific immunotherapies (ASI); however, the market has seen little clinical success. Promising animal studies of ASI have not yet been translated into clinical efficacy.

 

As such, world-leading immunologists have voiced that a new delivery mechanism that maximizes efficacy is necessary to push the first antigen-specific therapy through FDA approval.