New patch formulation of Alzheimer's drug brought to market in Canada

From the Canadian Press:
A new treatment option for Alzheimer's patients - the first licensed skin patch - could make life easier for both some people with the disease and their caregivers, experts say.

Novartis Pharmaceuticals Canada Inc. announced Tuesday it was bringing to the Canadian market a once-a-day skin patch formulation of its existing drug Exelon.

Exelon - its generic name is rivastigmine - currently is administered in the form of capsules which must be taken twice a day. Novartis said both the once-a-day formulation and the fact it is administered via a patch will help reduce the risk of confusion over whether the medication had been taken or not. ...more

Study questions long-term use of Alzheimer’s drugs

From the National Post:
As the main class of drugs licensed to treat Alzheimer's disease in Canada, they have limited impact on the devastating illness at the best of times. Now a troubling new study suggests that cholinesterase inhibitors may often be prescribed long after they can do any good, potentially exposing patients to unpleasant side effects for no real reason and burdening taxpayer-funded drug plans.

As well, more than a third of patients in the Ontario-based study were at the same time taking other drugs that would counteract the Alzheimer's pills' positive effects.

"We're using them much longer than they've ever been studied for and we're using them longer than they are in other locations," said Dr. Nathan Hermann, the study's lead author and head of the psychiatry division at Toronto's Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre. ...more

Antidepressant good as antipsychotic for dementia, fewer side-effects: study

From the Canadian Press:
An antidepressant appears to work as well as the most commonly prescribed antipsychotic medication in treating agitation and aggressive behaviour in people with Alzheimer's - but without the severe side-effects, a Canadian study suggests.

Researchers at Toronto's Baycrest geriatric centre and the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health teamed up to conduct a head-to-head trial of the antidepressant citalopram (Celexa) and the antipsychotic risperidone (Risperdal) in non-depressed patients with dementia.

During the 12-week study, 53 patients were treated with citalopram - one of the selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors, or SSRIs - and 50 received risperidone. Researchers found that the two medications were almost equally effective in controlling psychotic behaviour in patients. ...more

Heart attack drug may ward off Alzheimer’s

From the (London, UK) Times:
Taking statins may help to prevent Alzheimer’s disease, a study has directly suggested for the first time.

Researchers in the US claim to have uncovered clear evidence that the cholesterol-lowering drugs – taken daily by about three million people in Britain – could ward off the illness. The large-scale study, conducted at Boston University from 2002, found that the drugs may cut the risk of getting Alzheimer’s by as much as 79 per cent, even in people thought to be genetically susceptible to the disease. The lead author, Gail Li, said the study was the first to compare the brains of people who had received statins with those who had not.

Previous research has indicated that Alzheimer’s may be caused by poor blood flow and vascular changes in the brain, which statins may help to prevent. Dr Li, from the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle, and her colleagues examined the brains of 110 Americans who had died aged between 65 and 79, and had donated their organs for research. ...more

Drug for mild to moderate Alzheimer's also helps severe disease: study

From Canada East:
A drug used to treat mild to moderate Alzheimer's can also ease some symptoms in people with a more advanced stage of the condition, helping patients and their caregivers to better cope with the effects of the debilitating neurological disease, a Canadian-led international study has found.

While the drug donepezil does not arrest the progression of Alzheimer's disease, the study found it improved the memory and overall functioning of those taking the medication compared with patients given a placebo.

"So it slows down what we call the symptomatic progression of the disease," said principal investigator Dr. Sandra Black, a neurologist at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto. ...more

FDA approves patch to treat dementia

From CBC News:
The first patch to treat the dementia associated with Alzheimer's disease was approved Friday by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

The prescription patch from Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp. contains the drug Exelon, or rivastigmine, currently available in Canada and the U.S. in an oral solution and in capsule form.

The oral and capsule medications have already been approved for use in both Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease patients, to treat symptoms of mild to moderate dementia such as impaired thinking and memory loss. ...more

Drugs company cracks Parkinson's with cure

I've never heard of this drug before, but it sounds quite promising. It's probably a bit too simplistic to think it's the definitive cure for Parkinson's, but it does sound like it could be a breakthrough.

From the Cambridge (UK) Evening News:
A small drugs company at Godmanchester has come up with a cure for Parkinson's disease, which could also lead to a cure for Alzheimer's.

Phytopharm has been working for some years on reversing the devastating effects of these two killer diseases and announced last night that it had succeeded.

The drug, Cogane, works by stimulating naturally produced proteins that can regenerate neurons in the brain.

It will be five years, however, before the new drug passes all the regulatory tests and becomes generally available. ...more