Multi-million Dollar Trial to Investigate if Statins Could Become MS … – PR Newswire (press release)

The research will be led by Dr Jeremy Chataway, UCL Institute of Neurology, London, who led the phase 2 trial of simvastatin involving 140 people with SPMS that was published in The Lancet in 2014. The research found those taking high doses of simvastatin had a significant reduction in the rate of brain atrophy (brain shrinkage) over two years, and also had better disability and quality of life scores at the end of the study.

"This drug holds incredible promise for the thousands of people living with secondary progressive MS in the U.K., and around the world, who currently have few options for treatments that have an effect on disability," said Chataway. "This study will establish definitively whether simvastatin is able to slow the rate of disability progression over a three year period, and we are very hopeful it will."

Bruce Bebo, Executive Vice President, Research for the National MS Society said, "We are very pleased to be a partner in the public-private funding syndicate that was forged to support a phase 3 clinical trial of a repurposed, generic therapy for people with SPMS, for whom there are few treatment choices."

Susan Stellmacher, 62, of Minneapolis lives with SPMS. "I think it's absolutely exciting news," she said. "There has been nothing for meso to think that something so widely available and more affordable is possible -- that's exciting."

The trial will involve 1180 people with SPMS across the U.K. It will take six years to complete.

The trial will cost a total of nearly $7 million, with research costs of:

For more information about MS and the National MS Society: http://www.nationalmssociety.org

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SOURCE National Multiple Sclerosis Society

http://www.nmss.org

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Multi-million Dollar Trial to Investigate if Statins Could Become MS ... - PR Newswire (press release)