New Alzheimer's Drug Shows Promise

An anonymous reader writes "The Herald Sun is reporting that researchers may have some progress to report on the Alzheimer's front. A new drug, called PBT2, was developed by a Melbourne-based biotech firm that has been showing some promising results. From the article: 'Early clinical testing has confirmed the drug is fast-acting. Levels of amyloid dropped by 60 per cent within 24 hours of a single dose. It found also that PBT2 suppresses the impairment of memory function. More human studies begin in Sweden next month and Australians will join a major international trial of the drug next year.'"

Major news for nursing homes

[Nocterro]

If this drug is found to actually work, and proceeds to be available for general use within the next five years, it would be a major reversal of the trends we're seeing at the moment. I work in a nursing home designed and built in the 70's, when nursing homes tended to be the place you stayed briefly before dying. Now with our medical advances, together with the high level of day to day care, individually tailored diets etc, we're dealing with people who are living longer. This means we're now running into problems with alzheimers, excarberated by the cocktail of drugs administered. Effectively we're now running into trouble trying to keep people with high level dementia in unsuited facillities. The possibility of an effective treatment for alzheimers makes me wonder if we might be going to move back to the older situation, with lives limited by health again.

More info

[Cicero382]

It's interesting but not (yet) as significant as TFA makes out.

These are studies on transgenic mice, so it's more a proof-of-concept rather than clinical trials which will be some way off - mostly due to bureaucracy.

For those who want a quick *scientific-ish* summary:

It is widely believed that a protein called Beta-Amyloid is reponsible synaptic dysfunction in Altzheimer's disease. Another variant (Alpha-Amyloid) also does horrible things to the body such as renal failure and constrictive pericarditis. This often happens as a result of certain auto-immune diseases (which is my speciality).

These tests are based on the accidental discovery that a dysentry drug (PBT-1) has some effects on restoring some cognitive function in patients. The company pursuing this has created a drug which is more specifically targeted towards reducing levels of A-A. And... so far, so good. The mice show greatly reduced A-A levels and they perform better in mazes. I wish them all the best - Altzheimers is a horrible and frightening disease.

For those who would like a fuller summary in non newspaper-speak, try http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?ne wsid=47696 [medicalnewstoday.com]

This is interesting news

[Anonymous Coward]

Living through your parent's early onset (at 50 years) Alzheimer's really takes egde off any humour of this story. Personally, I welcome these news, there are too few of them. Unfortunately, this drug would come too late for my father, who has now been living with this for 15 years (he really takes his time to do things properly, even dying). New drugs would also offer some hope for relatives, since A is also hereditary to at least some extent.

Re:Promises, schmomises

[NevarMore]

It isn't that science isn't making progress, the issue is that science doesn't make progress suitable for todays media.

Modern scientific advancement is very incremental. In this case (hypothetical for the sake of discussion) someone had to find out that amyloid had something to do with Alzheimers, then maybe a chemical workup on what amyloid is, what causes the body to make/not make amyloid, then some lab tests to find out what chemicals would supress amyloid, and then maybe a few drug samples to test with. Oh and lets not forget that the researchers are answerable to universities, financiers, bosses, and the FDA along the way.

Think back to your science classes in high school. Even the basic experiments you did there still took 30-45 minutes and then again to write. When you consider the amount of data that professional science has to gather, process, and summarize to do the work correctly, I'm amazed that things move as fast as they do.

The media, and most casual readers, want to hear "new fantastic drug cure thingy on shelves now". Unfortunately you simply don't have that kind of whiz bang scientific advancement very often. Small, incremental possibilities don't make for good news, and to the unaware can lead to a distrust of science.

Re:Promises, schmomises

[bloodredsun]

As has been mentioned, there's nothing like the media to really blow a medical announcement out of all proportion. I think this stems from the fact that the possible (that's possible not probable) implications are enormous for a condition which has been a sentence to a painful and lingering type of death, and that nothing sells papers like a good old fashioned sensationalist take on a story, especially one that could affect the readers.

That it is a symptomatic treatment rather theat a cure is more due to out lack of knowledge of the underlying pathophysiology rather than a conspiracy to earn more money, although the reality is that a cure would be less lucractive. With the spiralling cost of novel drug creation, an easier and more lucrative target is always going to be the first one a company chooses. Not out of cynacism but out of commercial pressures.

You also mention the 2 assumptions of amyloid involvement in Alzheimers. I think that calling them assumptions is a little unfair as it indicates that there is little or no proof of their involvement in the condition. While there is plenty of proof of their involvement, there is no smoking gun that indicates that they have a direct causal involvement. Yes they are assumed to have a role, but that is because of the supporting data rather than some vague supposition.

That the timing is a little serendipidous if the company were looking for financial investment, so what? They are entitled to tell this news in the way the benefits them the most. In the UK, false promises get you in a whole load of trouble with various authorities, not least the BPPI. The biggest scandal of big pharma is the marketing cost of these products. Companies spend more money advertising these drugs then they do researching them. Drugs should be used on what is best for the patient, not what sticky pad is infront of the doctor or what their sexy rep tells then to prescribe. As doctors are only human this isn't the way it happens.

I was an academic researcher in neurosciences (mostly epilepsy with a little bit of parkinsons and alzheimers) and news like this can only be a good thing.

Re:Promises, schmomises

[Otter]

And is it me again, or do we almost never hear about these promising treatments years later?...Not that I would begrudge them that if they actually come through with a halfway effective drug.

There are several halfway effective treatments for Alzheimer's (Aricept, Exelon, Razadyne) although there's considerable room for improvement. The reason you only hear about wildly exaggerated "breakthroughs" is probably because you get your news about science here, and the editors are enthusiastic but completely lacking the slightest context with which to evaluate the significance of the press releases versus another.

(Also, most of the readership is young, and fortunately has no experience with pharmaceutical products except those they've seen on television, and is therefore unaware that anything exists besides Viagra and Cialis.)

Alzheimers gets all the attention

[istartedi]

There are many non-Alzheimer's dementias. It will be great if they can cure, or even treat Alzheimer's; but if that's the case, I hope it doesn't cause people to lose interest (and funding) to find treatments/cures for all the other types.

In related stories

[Budenny]

In two related stories from the UK, the National Institute for Clinical Excellence explained that this was not a cost effective treatment for early stage Alzheimers, but was endorsed for use by the National Health Service for extreme late stage cases with a life expectancy not exceeding 6 months. The news was applauded by the Ministry of Health, who released a statement yesterday in which they said that just as it was inappropriate to treat macular degeneration until it has caused the loss of sight in at least one eye, so it could not be a national priority to treat Alzheimers patients until they were well and truly demented.

The second story followed a day later, and consisted of a chorus of local health authorities explaining that they were not proposing to prescribe the drug in cases endorsed by NICE because it was too expensive and they were running out of budget, and of course, they would find it impossible to prescribe for cases where NICE had not endorsed it.

However, they encouraged the British public who felt that they would benefit from this and other treatments which they chose not to provide, or not to provide in a timely manner, to remortgage their houses, and pay for the treatments themselves. This after all was the general practice in the UK for other rare and exotic treatments for uncommon conditions, such as hip replacements, tamoxifen for breat cancer, diagnostic scans following accidents and so on.

Members of the British public, interviewed on the BBC, said they were delighted to be living in the UK and looked after by the NHS. It was after all the envy of the world, and free at the point of use. Many of them volunteered that they had been looked after in a most caring fashion by the staff of their local hospital, who had cured them of difficult cases of MRSA, doubtless contracted by their relatives not washing their hands before visiting the ward.

Re:Major news for nursing homes

[Psmylie]

My father-in-law had this disease in the last few years of his life, and it was pretty horrible. I have no intention to slam nursing homes (you guys have one hell of a hard job to do) but most of them are just not set up to deal with Alzheimer's or dementia. Many we talked refused to admit patients with Alzheimer's, since the confusion and fear the disease causes can lead to anger and violence. I understand and sympathize with nursing home staff. But, when we were dealing with my father-in-law, it became very clear to me that we needed actual Alzheimer's wards where they could specialize in their care.

For the most part (at least where I live) patients with Alzheimer's got shipped off to mental wards. That's where my father-in-law ended up for a while, before he became vegetative. He was convinced that he was in jail for something, and got angry because nobody would tell him why. He kept trying to get out, and pushed the orderlies when they tried to stop him. They ended up placing him in leather restraints (which, I understand, is NOT something they're supposed to do, especially long-term). We went to visit him one day and found him locked in a sweltering room with no air-conditioning or fans, strapped to a table, wearing nothing but an adult diaper, and screaming in rage and terror, because he didn't know why he was locked up.

I used to make Alzheimer's jokes, before I actually knew someone who had it. I feel bad about that now. This is a terrible disease. I'll throw a huge party the day they actually come up with a cure for it.