* Alzheimer's drug helped brain function
* Finding adds larger potential market for drug
*
(Adds Medivation chief executive David Hung)
By JoAnne Allen
WASHINGTON, Feb 8 (Reuters) - Dimebon, a pill being
developed for Alzheimer's disease, helped people with
Huntington's disease improve their thinking, learning and
memory skills, U.S. researchers said on Monday.
Dimebon, made by Medivation Inc. under the generic name
latrepirdine, appears to be safe for Huntington's patients and
has minimal side effects, the researchers reported in the
journal Archives of Neurology.
Dr. Karl Kieburtz of the University of Rochester in New
York said his team chose to study Dimebon because it appeared
to have an impact both on cognition and aging.
"In diseases like Huntington's disease where there is
degeneration of the brain, one thing we look for is compounds
that might favorably influence that and sometimes those
compounds come out of things that can slow natural aging,"
Kieburtz said in a telephone interview.
He said the independent study, involving 91 patients, was
sponsored by Medivation. A new follow-up trial with 350
patients is being conducted to see whether the initial findings
can be confirmed, Kieburtz said.
San Francisco-based Medivation has partnered with Pfizer
Inc. to develop and commercialize latrepirdine for the
treatment of Alzheimer's. The drug was first sold in Russia as
an antihistamine.
Medivation chief executive David Hung said on Monday the
company plans relatively soon to begin trials of altered forms
of Dimebon, called analogues, that may have potential against
an an array of disorders, including Parkinson's disease, stroke
and heart failure.
There is no cure for Huntington's disease, a highly
disabling disorder in which brain cells are damaged. People who
inherit the genetic mutation that causes Huntington's have a
100 percent chance of developing the fatal disease.
One drug, tetrabenazine, sold under the brand name
Xenazine, can help manage some of Huntington's symptoms but
does not prevent the physical and cognitive decline. Danish
pharmaceuticals group Lundbeck owns the rights to Xenazine,
which the company says has a sales potential of $250 million in
the United States alone.
Kieburtz and colleagues studied people with mild to
moderate Huntington's disease at 16 sites in the United States
and one in Britain from July 2007 to July 2008.
Over 90 days, 46 of the volunteers were given 20 milligrams
of latrepirdine three times a day. The other 45 patients took a
placebo.
The researchers said Dimebon appears to stabilize and
improve the functioning of cells damaged by the disease. It may
act specifically on the mitochondria, powerhouses inside the
cells that have their own unique DNA.
Side effects from the drug included headaches, falls and
dizziness.
The patients who took Dimebon showed improvement in average
scores on tests measuring cognitive function. The average
scores of people in the placebo group remained steady, the
report said.
"Huntington's disease is usually thought of as kind of a
movement disorder, but the thinking and behavior problems are
as, if not, more important than the motor problems of that
disease," Kieburtz said.
(Additional reporting by Ransdell Pierson)
(Editing by Maggie Fox and Cynthia Osterman)
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