New Parkinson’s drug found effective
A study conducted on 404 patients at several U.S. sites has determined that a new drug called Rasagiline effectively treats early-stage Parkinsons disease. The study was reported in the December Archives of Neurology.
“These findings are especially important since hopes for treating Parkinsons with fetal cells were recently dashed,” said Technion-Israel Institute of Technology Professor Moussa Youdim, who developed Rasagiline with Prof. John Finberg of the Department of Pharmacology at the Technion.
The study was conducted as part of the clinical trials for FDA approval. Rasagiline is now in the last stage of the approval process with a decision expected later this year. Teva Pharmaceuticals will then market the new drug.
Research participants were randomized in the double-blind, placebo-controlled study. Participants were given 1 or 2 milligrams a day for one week, followed by a 25-week maintenance period.
The treatments effectiveness was measured by Unified Parkinsons Disease Rating Scale (UPDR) and compared with the control group that received a placebo. The group that received 1 milligram showed an improvement of 4.2 UPDR units on average. Those who received 2 milligrams showed an improvement of 3.56 UPDR units.
The report called for further study to evaluate Rasagilines long-term effects on the progression of the disease. This is now in progress.
Prof. Youdim heads the Eve Topf Neuro-Degenerative Disease Research and Teaching Center at the Faculty of Medicine at the Technion, where he develops a variety of drugs for neurodegenerative diseases. As early as 1975, Prof. Youdim and colleagues introduced I-Deprenyl (Selegiline), a drug that has been shown to slow the progress of Parkinsons disease.
Contact: Martha Molnar
e-mail: martha@ats.org
Media Contact
All latest news from the category: Health and Medicine
This subject area encompasses research and studies in the field of human medicine.
Among the wide-ranging list of topics covered here are anesthesiology, anatomy, surgery, human genetics, hygiene and environmental medicine, internal medicine, neurology, pharmacology, physiology, urology and dental medicine.
Newest articles
Bringing bio-inspired robots to life
Nebraska researcher Eric Markvicka gets NSF CAREER Award to pursue manufacture of novel materials for soft robotics and stretchable electronics. Engineers are increasingly eager to develop robots that mimic the…
Bella moths use poison to attract mates
Scientists are closer to finding out how. Pyrrolizidine alkaloids are as bitter and toxic as they are hard to pronounce. They’re produced by several different types of plants and are…
AI tool creates ‘synthetic’ images of cells
…for enhanced microscopy analysis. Observing individual cells through microscopes can reveal a range of important cell biological phenomena that frequently play a role in human diseases, but the process of…