Emerging treatments

Antiadenoviral agents

Research is directed toward finding a treatment for adenovirus. Several HIV medications and other novel molecules appear promising and have entered phase 2 clinical trials. An antiadenoviral effect has been observed with zalcitabine, sanilbudine, stampidine, interferon beta, aganocide, and antiosteopontin peptide. Antiadenoviral activity occurs in nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (zalcitabine and sanilbudine) but not in non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors or protease inhibitors.[105][106] Another potential treatment is povidone-iodine. In one in vitro study, povidine-iodine was found to extinguish infectivity of free adenovirus after 10 minutes of exposure, but was less effective against intracellular adenovirus.[107] A prospective clinical trial in children found povidone-iodine ineffective against adenovirus, although another retrospective study showed that povidone-iodine safely improved recovery times compared with controls.[108][109] A combination of povidone-iodine and dexamethasone has been shown to produce a significant reduction in DNA copies by day 5.[110] Topical cobalt chelate CTC-96, or doxivir, showed antiadenoviral activity in vitro.[111]

Tacrolimus or interferon alfa

One randomized, double-masked study has shown that both tacrolimus and interferon alfa-2b appear to be effective and safe in the treatment of recalcitrant vernal keratoconjunctivitis.[112] One meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials has shown that tacrolimus is effective in treating vernal keratoconjunctivitis.[113]

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