New drug found to slow early Alzheimer's disease symptoms: Study

A new drug has been found to slow cognitive and functional decline in people with early symptomatic Alzheimer’s disease (AD), according to the results of the phase 3 clinical trials.

The data about the drug donanemab, developed by American pharmaceutical firm Eli Lilly and Company, was shared at the 2023 Alzheimer’s Association International Conference (AAIC) in the Netherlands, and simultaneously published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).

”The positive data bring hope to people with Alzheimer’s disease who urgently need new treatment options,” said Anne White, executive vice president of Eli Lilly and Company.

”If approved, we believe donanemab can provide clinically meaningful benefits for people with this disease and the possibility of completing their course of treatment as early as 6 months once their amyloid plaque is cleared,” White said in a statement.

The clinical trial included 1,736 participants with early symptomatic Alzheimer’s disease and amyloid and tau pathology, a predictive biomarker for disease progression. Participants were randomised in a 1:1 ratio to receive donanemab (860) or placebo (876) intravenously every four weeks for 72 weeks.

”Among participants with early symptomatic Alzheimer’s disease and amyloid and tau pathology, donanemab significantly slowed clinical progression at 76 weeks in those with low/medium tau and in the combined low/medium and high tau pathology population,” the authors of the study noted.

A further analysis of low-medium tau participants based on age showed greater benefit of donanemab in patients under the age of 75, the researchers said.

In participants under the age of 75 (542), donanemab slowed decline by 48 per cent on Alzheimer’s Disease Rating Scale (iADRS) and 45 per cent on Clinical Dementia Rating-Sum of Boxes, or CDR-SB, commonly used to diagnose dementia due to Alzheimer’s disease (AD).

The overall treatment effect of donanemab continued to grow throughout the trial, with the largest differences versus placebo seen at 18 months.

”These results demonstrate that diagnosing and treating people earlier in the course of Alzheimer’s disease may lead to greater clinical benefit,” said Liana Apostolova distinguished professor at the Indiana University School of Medicine, US.

”The delay of disease progression over the course of the trial is significant and will give people more time to do such things that are meaningful to them,” Apostolova added.