Supernus Pharmaceuticals Advances SPN812 Into Phase IIa U.S. Clinical Trial For Attention-deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)

Supernus Pharmaceuticals, Inc. announced the initiation of a Phase IIa U.S. clinical trial of its product candidate SPN812 for the treatment of Attention-deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in adults. The trial is a proof-of-concept, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study in healthy adults aged 18 to 64, inclusive, with ADHD. Supernus expects to enroll 50 subjects in the study at 5 sites across the United States. The primary objective is to measure safety and tolerability, with a secondary measure of efficacy in reducing symptoms of ADHD. SPN812 has previously been marketed outside the United States with a good tolerability and safety profile.

"We are excited to advance our second ADHD portfolio product into Phase II as we make steady progress across all of our pipeline products," said Jack Khattar, Supernus president and CEO. "Nearly 10 million American adults are estimated to suffer from ADHD, and about 30% of patients do not adequately respond to or cannot tolerate stimulant ADHD treatments. The mechanism of action of SPN812 appears to be promising as a novel treatment of ADHD and we believe it represents a strong alternative to existing ADHD regimens in the United States."

 ADHD: Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder in Children, Adolescents, and Adults

About Supernus' ADHD Portfolio

SPN812 is one of three compounds being developed by Supernus to treat patients with ADHD. Supernus previously announced positive results from its Phase IIa proof-of-concept study of SPN810 for the treatment of children with ADHD who exhibit persistent serious conduct problems. That trial, which met the primary endpoints of safety and tolerability, showed statistically significant reduction versus baseline in conduct problems across all doses in children 6 to 12 years of age diagnosed with ADHD. Supernus also is developing SPN811 as a novel stimulant ADHD treatment, and the company expects to initiate a Phase II proof-of-concept trial in 2011.

About ADHD in Children and Adults

Attention-deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the most common childhood disorders and can continue through adolescence and adulthood. Symptoms include difficulty staying focused and paying attention, difficulty controlling behavior, and hyperactivity (over-activity). In the United States, approximately 7.8% of all school-aged children, or about 4.4 million children aged 4 to 17 years, have been diagnosed with ADHD at some point in their lives, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The disorder is also estimated to affect 4.4 percent of US adults aged 18 to 44 based on results from the National Comorbidity Survey Replication. A report from the market research firm Datamonitor estimates that the adults who have ADHD in the US total almost 10 million persons.

Source:  Supernus Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

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Brain Atrophy Responsible For Depression In People Battling Multiple Sclerosis

Adding to all that ails people managing their multiple sclerosis is depression for which MS sufferers have a lifetime risk as high as 50 percent.

Yet despite its prevalence, the cause of this depression is not understood. It's not related to how severe one's MS is, and it can occur at any stage of the disease. That suggests it is not simply a psychological reaction that comes from dealing with the burden of a serious neurologic disorder.

Now, in the first such study in living humans, researchers at UCLA suggest a cause, and it's not psychological, but physical: atrophy of a specific region of the hippocampus, a critical part of the brain involved in mood and memory, among other functions.


Healing Multiple Sclerosis: Diet, Detox & Nutritional Makeover for Total Recovery

Reporting in the early online edition of the journal Biological Psychiatry, senior study author Dr. Nancy Sicotte, a UCLA associate professor of neurology, Stefan Gold, lead author and a postdoctoral fellow in the UCLA Multiple Sclerosis Program, and colleagues used high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging to identify three key sub-regions of the hippocampus that were found to be smaller in people with MS when compared with the brains of healthy individuals.

The researchers also found a relationship between this atrophy and hyperactivity of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, a complex set of interactions among three glands. The HPA axis is part of the neuroendocrine system that controls reactions to stress and regulates many physiological processes. It's thought that this dysregulation may play a role in the atrophy of the hippocampus and the development of depression.

"Depression is one of the most common symptoms in patients with multiple sclerosis," Gold said. "It impacts cognitive function, quality of life, work performance and treatment compliance. Worst of all, it's also one of the strongest predictors of suicide."

The researchers examined three sub-regions of the hippocampus region CA1, CA3 and the dentate gyrus area of the hippocampal region called CA23DG (CA stands for cornu ammonis). They imaged 29 patients with relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis and compared them with 20 healthy control subjects who did not have MS. They also measured participants' cortisol level three times a day; cortisol is a major stress hormone produced by the HPA axis that affects many tissues in the body, including the brain.

In addition to the difference between MS patients and healthy controls, the researchers found that the multiple sclerosis patients diagnosed with depression showed a smaller CA23DG sub-region of the hippocampus, along with excessive release of cortisol from the HPA axis.

"Interestingly, this idea of a link between excessive activity of the HPA axis and reduced brain volume in the hippocampus hasn't received a lot of attention, despite the fact that the most consistently reproduced findings in psychiatric patients with depression (but without MS) include hyperactivity of the HPA axis and smaller volumes of the hippocampus," Sicotte said.

"So the next step is to compare MS patients with depression to psychiatric patients with depression to see how the disease progresses in each," she said.

Other authors of the study included Kyle C. Kern, Mary-Frances O'Connor, Michael J. Montag, Aileen Kim, Ye S. Yoo and Barbara S. Giesser, all of UCLA.

Funding was provided by the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, the National Institutes of Health, the UCLA Cousins Center for Psychoneuroimmunology, and Claire and William Vaughn.

The authors report no conflicts of interest.

The UCLA Department of Neurology encompasses more than a dozen research, clinical and teaching programs that cover brain mapping and neuroimaging, movement disorders, Alzheimer's disease, multiple sclerosis, neurogenetics, nerve and muscle disorders, epilepsy, neuro-oncology, neurotology, neuropsychology,headaches and migraines, neurorehabilitation, and neurovascular disorders. The department ranks first among its peers nationwide in National Institutes of Health funding.

Source: University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)

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