Lilly’s Alzheimer’s drug shows promise in slowing memory loss

Hannah Blake

pharmaphorum

Eli Lilly &amp, Co has announced the detailed results from its phase 3 clinical trials of its experimental Alzheimer’s drug, solanezumab. Back in August, Eli Lilly stated that clinical trials of solanezumab missed their primary goals of stopping memory loss in patients with mild-to-moderate Alzheimer’s. However, detailed results of both trials, looking only at patients with mild Alzheimer’s, show that when pooled together the drug led to a 34 % reduction in memory decline for patients over a period of 18 months, compared to those on placebo.

This significant statistic means the company now has potential to seek approval for solanezumab, although it is unlikely the FDA will approve without further clinical trials to prove the benefit.

"Alzheimer's disease research has been extremely challenging. The data results from the solanezumab Phase 3 trials were encouraging to the ADCS team. These results represent an important step for the medical, academic, and scientific communities in understanding brain amyloid as a target of AD therapies.”

Rachelle Doody, M.D., Ph.D., professor of Neurology and the Effie Marie Cain Chair in Alzheimer's Disease Research, Baylor College of Medicine and member of the steering committee for the Alzheimer's Disease Cooperative Study (ADCS).

Approximately 36 million people worldwide are believed to have Alzheimer’s and as the world’s population lives longer, this number is expected to increase considerably.

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