Posted on 01/09/2008 2:14:21 PM PST by blam
Reversal Of Alzheimer's Symptoms Within Minutes In Human Study
PET Scan of Alzheimer's Disease Brain. (Credit: NIH/National Institute On Aging)
ScienceDaily (Jan. 9, 2008) — An extraordinary new scientific study, which for the first time documents marked improvement in Alzheimer’s disease within minutes of administration of a therapeutic molecule, has just been published in the Journal of Neuroinflammation.
This new study highlights the importance of certain soluble proteins, called cytokines, in Alzheimer’s disease. The study focuses on one of these cytokines, tumor necrosis factor-alpha(TNF), a critical component of the brain’s immune system. Normally, TNF finely regulates the transmission of neural impulses in the brain. The authors hypothesized that elevated levels of TNF in Alzheimer’s disease interfere with this regulation. To reduce elevated TNF, the authors gave patients an injection of an anti-TNF therapeutic called etanercept. Excess TNF-alpha has been documented in the cerebrospinal fluid of patients with Alzheimer’s.
The new study documents a dramatic and unprecedented therapeutic effect in an Alzheimer’s patient: improvement within minutes following delivery of perispinal etanercept, which is etanercept given by injection in the spine. Etanercept (trade name Enbrel) binds and inactivates excess TNF. Etanercept is FDA approved to treat a number of immune-mediated disorders and is used off label in the study.
The use of anti-TNF therapeutics as a new treatment choice for many diseases, such as rheumatoid arthritis and potentially even Alzheimer’s, was recently chosen as one of the top 10 health stories of 2007 by the Harvard Health Letter.
Similarly, the Neurotechnology Industry Organization has recently selected new treatment targets revealed by neuroimmunology (such as excess TNF) as one of the top 10 Neuroscience Trends of 2007. And the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives has chosen the pilot study using perispinal etanercept for Alzheimer’s for inclusion and discussion in their 2007 Progress Report on Brain Research.
The lead author of the study, Edward Tobinick M.D., is an assistant clinical professor of medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles and director of the Institute for Neurological Research, a private medical group in Los Angeles. Hyman Gross, M.D., clinical professor of neurology at the University of Southern California, was co-author.
The study is accompanied by an extensive commentary by Sue Griffin, Ph.D., director of research at the Donald W. Reynolds Institute on Aging at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) in Little Rock and at the Geriatric Research and Clinical Center at the VA Hospital in Little Rock, who along with Robert Mrak, M.D., chairman of pathology at University of Toledo Medical School, are editors-in-chief of the Journal of Neuroinflammation.
Griffin and Mrak are pioneers in the field of neuroinflammation. Griffin published a landmark study in 1989 describing the association of cytokine overexpression in the brain and Alzheimer’s disease. Her research helped pave the way for the findings of the present study. Griffin has recently been selected for membership in the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives, a nonprofit organization of more than 200 leading neuroscientists, including ten Nobel laureates.
“It is unprecedented that we can see cognitive and behavioral improvement in a patient with established dementia within minutes of therapeutic intervention,” said Griffin. “It is imperative that the medical and scientific communities immediately undertake to further investigate and characterize the physiologic mechanisms involved. This gives all of us in Alzheimer’s research a tremendous new clue about new avenues of research, which is so exciting and so needed in the field of Alzheimer’s. Even though this report predominantly discusses a single patient, it is of significant scientific interest because of the potential insight it may give into the processes involved in the brain dysfunction of Alzheimer’s.”
While the article discusses one patient, many other patients with mild to severe Alzheimer’s received the treatment and all have shown sustained and marked improvement.
The new study, entitled “Rapid cognitive improvement in Alzheimer’s disease following perispinal etanercept administration,” and the accompanying commentary, entitled “Perispinal etanercept: Potential as an Alzheimer’s therapeutic,” are available on the Web site of the Journal of Neuroinflammation.
Author Hyman Gross, M.D., has no competing interests. Author Edward Tobinick, M.D. owns stock in Amgen, the manufacturer of etanercept, and has multiple issued and pending patents assigned to TACT IP LLC that describe the parenteral and perispinal use of etanercept for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease and other neurological disorders, including, but not limited to, U.S. patents 6015557, 6177077, 6419934, 6419944, 6537549, 6982089, 7214658 and Australian patent 758523.
Adapted from materials provided by University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences.
I inevitably think of Reagan whenever Alzheimer’s comes up. There are an incredibly tiny number of mortal men I consider to be heroes, people genuinely worthy of mass adoration. For me, Reagan is at the top of that list. He was a genuinely great man and I (notorious in my small world for being unemotional) can easily tear up when watching any kind of show about him.
MM (in TX)
You have to keep this stuff incredibly pure because it's used in such small amounts with such large systemic effects. That costs, too.
Nursing Homes here is SW Virginia are going for 4K to 6K a month. This is a drug that if it worked, it could save Medicare. Hopefully the FDA will fast track this drug. One funny side effect will be what happens when the patieats memory returns, They are going to be pissed to find out their house got sold to pay for their nursing home care.
Right with you. One hopes like the wonder drugs Streptomycin and Penicillin, the financial cost will not be prohibitive. It would pay government to factor in the eventual savings, should Alzheimers be halted. As a WW2 veteran, your father must have seen quite a lot of life and his memories would have been a mainstay.
I had an ingrowing abcess in the shoulder bone at 15 years of age in 1947. I was told that three years earlier, I would have faced an amputation. Forty years earlier, very likely my demise. Scotsman Fleming is my man of the century. Penicillen saved me. Plus surgery.
My respects and well wishes to your father.
lol
The multi-billion-dollar infanticide industry and chief laundromat for Democrat campaign dough will come up with something.
Wow, hope it’s true. My maternal grandmother died of this. It was horrible, and it took forever. In the end, she had the cognition of a mouse, maybe less. Didn’t recognize anyone or anything and didn’t understand a thing going on around her — and was scared out of her wits by it all. No one deserves that. Well, maybe bin Laden.
But they give it intrathecal, right in the spinal cord and the docs may not do that. But man, this is exciting isn’t it?
I'd work extra or overtime if one of my parents (long gone now) needed it.
Imagine,,a drug that would help Altz and arthritis!
Is your memory better?
Ping.
This is something to keep an eye on!
Your numbers are off by a few orders of magnitude - 5 million patients * $900/month * 12 months/year = $54 billion per year.
In all likelihood, Enbel won't end up being ideal on it's own for Alzheimer's, so we'll have to see what the cost ends up being for the product(s) that are. It'll be big money, in any case
45 million a month. Chickenfeed. You oughta see what Alzheimers' is costing now, not just in medicine but nursing home costs, hospitalizations and all the associated services.
Interesting article.
Or like Jonas Salk and his work.
Heard that same song all my life and I am 70 now.
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