Clinical trials expand for tau-based Alzheimer’s treatment

TauRx Therapeutics, the Singapore-based biopharmaceutical company behind a novel tau-modifying Alzheimer’s therapy, is adding 35 new U.S. research sites to its phase III clinical trials network currently researching the drug LMTX as a potential therapy to slow and prevent the progression of Alzheimer’s in patients with mild to moderate cognitive impairment.

Tau fibrils are one of the hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease in addition to amyloid plaque deposition. LMTX, instead of other anti-amyloid drug treatments, is a second generation tau aggregation inhibitor that would ideally alter the disease process and limit neuronal damage before it is too late in not only Alzheimer’s patients but those with frontotemporal dementia.

“This compound is potentially a disease-modifying approach to treating Alzheimer's, targeting the tangles of tau protein that develop in the brain which are clearly linked to the progression of dementia. We are pleased to expand the number of research centers conducting our clinical trial to permit more people across the U.S. to access our study,” said Claude M. Wischik, MD, the company’s cofounder and chairman, in a statement. “Only by participating in clinical studies such as ours, can we collectively – in partnership with those living with Alzheimer's – help advance the essential research that can result in the development of new medicines for this terminal medical condition."

The company was established in 2002 and now is engaged in global clinical trials with most of its research based in Aberdeen, Scotland. The addition of 35 American medical centers will bring in research from Bennington, Vt.; Farmington Hills, Mich.; Waukesha, Wis.; and Creve Coeur, Mo.