Rheumatoid arthritis
Epidyme's lead development prospect is a treatment for rheumatoid
arthritis. This disease is characterized by a painful
inflammation
of the joints which typically leads to progressive joint damage
and increasingly restricted mobility. Rheumatoid athritis is
estimated to affect 20 million people worldwide and accounted
for over $7bn of pharmaceutical industry sales in 2004.
It is well accepted that an autoimmune reaction lies at the
root of rheumatoid arthritis. The mechanism of action of
current leading therapies for this condition is to interfere
with important pathways in the immune system of
sufferers. However, these drugs
are not successful in all patients, have a significant
range of contraindications and substantial levels of
unwanted effects, many stemming from the degree
to which they compromise the immune system. Although these drugs have substantial
quality-of-life benefits for patients, they impose a long-term dependence on drug therapy, since
they do not cure the underlying condition and must be taken regularly to prevent its damaging effects.
In contrast a treatment based on our technology of
specific tolerance is not expected to lead to
compromised general immunity. We anticipate that treatment intervals will be greatly extended compared to current therapies, so that after a period it might be possible to reduce the dosage schedule to a once-a-year booster shot. Proof of concept studies
have shown that this method can be very effective in
experimental models of the disease. We are currently
completing further pre-clinical studies and expect to begin
early stage clinical research in 2008.
Rheumatoid arthritis proof of concept trial
The study was designed to determine the effects of two
test doses of a combination of beta-glucuronidase and
type II collagen on the incidence and severity of
collagen-induced arthritis. Both treatment doses
altered the course of arthritis in the experiment. The
much less marked reduction with low dose treatment, which appeared
as a delay on progression, was significant
within the experiment. Improvement of treatment levels with
the low dose may be achievable by giving further doses
as disease progresses. The alteration to the course of
the disease observed following high dose treatment is
suggestive of a potent anti-arthritic effect. The fact
that this level of protection was observed following a single
treatment is highly encouraging.
