The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved Sandoz’s Enzeevu (aflibercept-abzv), the drugmaker’s biosimilar for wet age-related macular degeneration (AMD). Available as a 2mg vial kit and pre-filled syringe, the biosimilar– which references Regeneron and Bayer’s Eylea (aflibercept) – is indicated to improve and maintain visual acuity in patients with the eye disease. Enzeevu joins Biocon Biologics’s Yesafili (aflibercept-jbvf) and Samsung Bioepis’ Opuviz (aflibercept-yszy) in the list of FDA-approved biosimilars to Eylea. Yesafili and Opuviz were both greenlit by the agency as the first biosimilars in May this year. They were both designated as interchangeable products. The FDA has provisionally said Enzeevu would be interchangeable with Eylea as “it is currently subject to an unexpired exclusivity for the first interchangeable biosimilar products”, as per a 12 August press release. Interchangeable biosimilars are eligible for a year of market exclusivity if they are the first biosimilar of a given product ...
Bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) is a condition that impacts 65% of preterm infants, leading to chronic lung disease and neurodevelopmental impairments that persist throughout life. BPD typically arises when premature infants require respiratory support and prolonged oxygen therapy, which can damage their developing lungs. Currently, options for predicting, preventing, and treating BPD are inadequate. Diagnoses are often not confirmed until 36 weeks post-menstrual age, delaying interventions that could reduce lung damage and enhance respiratory health. Existing early prediction tools do not effectively address the underlying pathology of the disease. However, timely lung protective measures can modify BPD incidence. More precise care could be administered if the likelihood of lung damage and other complications in these infants were known sooner. Researchers have now developed a blood test that can predict which preterm infants will go on to develop chronic lung disease, facilitating earlier intervention and more focused treatment strategies. The research, led ...
Approximately 10-15% of children experience recurrent respiratory infections, prompting hospital visits where blood tests are commonly performed to check for antibody deficiencies. Yet, these tests often fail to provide helpful insights. There is a pressing need for alternative methods that better assess the severity of the condition, which would aid in determining when increased care or antibiotic treatment is necessary. Now, new research reveals that saliva testing might offer a more accurate reflection of the severity of recurrent respiratory infections in children compared to traditional blood tests. If saliva contains too few broadly protective antibodies, there is a higher likelihood of pneumonia episodes for the children. The collaborative study by researchers at Radboudumc Amalia Children’s Hospital (Nijmegen, Netherlands) and UMC Utrecht Wilhelmina Children’s Hospital (Utrecht, Netherlands) involving 100 children with recurrent respiratory infections found that saliva tests are better indicators of disease severity than blood tests. The study demonstrated no ...
By Don Tracy, Associate Editor Approval of neffy marks a significant advancement in epinephrine delivery, offering a less painful alternative to traditional needle injections.The FDA has approved ARS Pharmaceuticals’ neffy (epinephrine nasal spray), a first-in-class needle-free, nasal spray treatment for type I allergic reactions, such as anaphylaxis, for adults and children weighing 66 lbs. or more. According to the company, this approval offers a less painful alternative to traditional needle injections, which are often delayed due to anxiety, potentially worsening allergic reactions.1 “Until today, patients with severe allergic reactions, including anaphylaxis, only had one treatment option—an often painful and anxiety-inducing needle injection of epinephrine. In some cases, patients would delay or not administer the life-saving treatment at the onset of symptoms, increasing the risk for a severe reaction or negative outcomes requiring additional emergency medical treatment,” said Thomas B. Casale, MD, professor of medicine, pediatrics, and chief of clinical and ...
The White House might soon finalize a rule that will either save or cost patients billions of dollars in prescription drug costs. The rule concerns “copay accumulators,” which are programs health plans use to prevent copay assistance from counting toward patients’ deductibles or out-of-pocket maximums. By Katie AdamsThe White House could soon finalize a rule that will either save or cost patients billions of dollars in prescription drug costs. The rule concerns “copay accumulators,” which are programs health plans use to prevent copay assistance from counting toward patients’ deductibles or out-of-pocket maximums. Typically, when patients receive copay assistance from pharmaceutical companies, the amount paid by the manufacturer helps reduce the patient’s out-of-pocket costs. But with copay accumulators, the assistance from the drugmaker is not counted toward the patient’s maximum limit on out-of-pocket expenses. In September of last year, Judge John D. Bates of the U.S. District Court for the District ...
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved ARS Pharmaceuticals‘ neffy (epinephrine nasal spray) 2mg for the emergency treatment of allergic reactions (type I). The indications include life-threatening anaphylaxis in adults and children weighing a minimum of 30kg. Previously, only injectable epinephrine was available for such patients. Anaphylaxis is a severe allergic reaction that can quickly become fatal, necessitating immediate medical intervention. Common triggers include certain foods, medications and insect stings, with symptoms such as hives, swelling, and difficulty breathing typically manifesting within minutes of exposure. The approval of neffy is supported by data from four clinical studies involving 175 healthy adults. These studies compared the blood concentration levels of epinephrine after administering neffy or traditional epinephrine injections. The findings indicated that neffy delivers comparable epinephrine levels to those of injectable products. In addition to matching the epinephrine blood concentrations, neffy demonstrated similar increases in blood pressure and heart ...
Sable Therapeutics has entered into an exclusive global licensing agreement with Columbia University to develop new polycation nanomedicines aimed at treating obesity. This partnership will focus on progressing a portfolio of compounds, SBL-001 and SBL-002, targeting both visceral and subcutaneous adiposity. Sable will hold sole rights for the development and commercialisation of the intellectual property created by Columbia University’s Dr Kam Leong, biomedical engineering professor Samuel Sheng, and Sable Therapeutics scientific co-founder Dr Li Qiang. SBL-001 and SBL-002 are designed to significantly diminish fat cell volume and have been uniquely engineered for selective uptake by adipose cells. Key features of the compounds include the ability to reduce fat cell targeted uptake volume by up to 70%. They can also act as a discrete drug delivery system for other agents, such as GLP-1s, which reduce fat. Sable Therapeutics focuses on creating assets for fat reduction, targeting conditions such as visceral obesity ...
Researchers from King’s College London have developed a new artificial intelligence (AI) brain imaging model in collaboration with University College London (UCL) which is realistic and accurate enough to use in medical research. Published in Nature Medicine Intelligence, the three-dimensional, synthetic images of the human brain could help support research to predict, diagnose and treat brain diseases including dementia, stroke and multiple sclerosis. According to Brain Research UK, there are an estimated 11 million people in the UK who are living with a neurological condition. Among the most common are Alzheimer’s disease, epilepsy and stroke. In collaboration with the London Medical Imaging and AI Centre for Value-Based Healthcare and NVIDIA data scientists and engineers, researchers trained the AI model in weeks as opposed to months using the NVIDIA Cambridge-1 supercomputer. The model is able to produce 3D, high-resolution images that have all the characteristics of real human brains, including correct ...
A US study supported by the Parkinson’s Foundation has revealed that genetic variants associated with Parkinson’s disease (PD) are more common than researchers previously thought. The PD GENEration study published in the journal Brain has been testing for clinically relevant PD-related genes while providing genetic counselling at no cost for people living with the condition since 2019, and recently reached a recruitment milestone of more than 15,000 patients. PD is a neurodegenerative condition in which parts of the brain become progressively damaged, causing problems such as shaking and stiffness. Results from the first 3.5 years of the study showed that 13% of patients have a genetic form of PD and revealed that positivity rates for a genetic variant were significantly higher for individuals at high risk of developing PD. Those with early-onset PD, high risk-ancestry such as Ashkenazi Jewish, Spanish Basque, or North African Berber, or with first-degree relatives affected ...
Shanghai Henlius Biotech, Inc. (2696.HK) announced that the first patient has been dosed in a phase 2 clinical trial (NCT06349980) of HLX53, an anti-TIGIT Fc fusion protein, in combination with HANSIZHUANG (serplulimab, HLX10) and HANBEITAI (bevacizumab, HLX04) for the first-line treatment of locally advanced or metastatic hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Liver cancer is one of the most prevalent malignancy in the world. According to GLOBALCAN 2022, there are about 870,000 new cases diagnosed and 760,000 deaths for the tumour in the globe. Meanwhile, primary liver cancer (PLC) is the fifth most common cause and the second mortality cancer in China, with about 370,000 new cases and 320,000 deaths in 2022. From which, hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the predominant pathological type of PLC, which accounts for between 75% and 85% of liver cancer cases. Due to its insidious onset, lack of symptom in its early stage, and quick progression, PLC usually has ...
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