We spoke to Prothena’s chief medical officer, Dr Hideki Garren, to hear more about both programs.
When asked why the Ireland headquartered company went down the treatment and preventative route in its development of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) therapies, he told us: “Essentially we want to try and reach as many Alzheimer’s disease patients as possible.”
AD affects more than 5.8 million Americans and is considered the most common neurodegenerative disorder.
Garren noted the great science that has been occurring in the last couple of decades in relation to diagnosing AD. “There has been lots of innovation in terms of diagnosing patients, finding patients earlier, even identifying patients at risk. As these innovations and the identification of patients [continue to] evolve, we want to have treatments as well as prevention options available for patients.”
PRX012 is designed to be administered by subcutaneous injection to provide a more convenient method and schedule of administration to facilitate patient access.
Garren shared key takeaways from the company’s poster presentation on that monoclonal antibody at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference (AAIC) 2021.
“It is a very high potency and very high affinity antibody, and it has been shown to have 11 times higher binding affinity than the approved treatment, aducanumab, in side by side experiments. So, therefore, we think it should have higher efficacy, and potential safety, as well as convenience for patients [compared to other anti-Aβ therapies].”