scholarly journals GDNF treatment in Parkinson's disease: time for controlled clinical trials?

Brain ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 125 (10) ◽  
pp. 2149-2151 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. Brundin
Keyword(s):  
Parkinson’S Disease ◽  
Parkinson's Disease ◽  
Clinical Trials ◽  
Controlled Clinical Trials

Meta-analysis of Placebo-controlled Clinical Trials of Safinamide and Entacapone as Add-on Therapy to Levodopa in the Treatment of Parkinson’s Disease

2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (01) ◽  
pp. 15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jörg Schnitker ◽  
Thomas Müller ◽  
◽  
Keyword(s):  
Parkinson’S Disease ◽  
Parkinson's Disease ◽  
Clinical Trials ◽  
Rating Scale ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Search Term ◽  
Motor Complications ◽  
Controlled Clinical Trials ◽  
Total Incidence ◽  
Double Blinded

Chronic levodopa (L-dopa) treatment of Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients is sooner or later associated with the onset of motor complications, for example wearing off and dyskinesia. PD patients with motor complications usually require the addition of further PD drugs to reduce these L-dopa side effects and enhance its efficacy. Entacapone is an available catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) inhibitor, which was extensively investigated as add-on to L-dopa/dopadecarboxylase inhibitor (DDCI) application in PD patients. Safinamide, a watersoluble, orally active a-aminoamide derivative, which modulates dopaminergic and glutamatergic neurotransmission with a unique dual mechanism of action, has been studied in two placebo-controlled clinical trials as add-on therapy to L-dopa in fluctuating PD patients. To date, there are no head-to-head clinical trials comparing the efficacy of safinamide and entacapone in the clinic. The aim of this meta-analysis was to determine effect sizes of safinamide and entacapone as add-on treatment to L-dopa in fluctuating PD patients. A systematic search of the literature on entacapone trials up to the end of September 2014 was first conducted on the MEDLINE and EMBASE databases in order to identify appropriate studies. Definition criteria for inclusion were prospective, randomised, placebocontrolled and double-blinded trials on the efficacy and safety of entacapone or safinamide in fluctuating L-dopa-treated PD patients. Four studies for entacapone and two trials on safinamide were considered. Data from the safinamide trials were provided by Zambon and therefore ‘safinamide’ was not used as a search term. Safinamide and entacapone treatment was comparable in terms of the main efficacy variables (offtime, percentageontime, Unified Parkinson’s Disease Rating Scale). Significant advantages in favour of safinamide were shown in terms of the total incidence of adverse events (AEs) in comparison to placebo, the study discontinuation due to AEs and deaths and in the risk differences of the AEs versus placebo, particularly for nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, dizziness, urine abnormality and shortness of breath. The odds ratio (OR) of 0.907 for any AE corresponds to an overall AE rate of 68.7 % for safinamide whereas the OR of 2.089 to an overall AE rate of 84.4 % for entacapone.

scholarly journals Neuropharmacological Treatment of Mental Dysfunction in Parkinson’s Disease

2006 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick McNamara ◽  
Raymon Durso
Keyword(s):  
Parkinson’S Disease ◽  
Parkinson's Disease ◽  
Clinical Trials ◽  
Motor Impairment ◽  
Effective Strategy ◽  
Controlled Clinical Trials ◽  
New Agents ◽  
Cholinergic Function ◽  
Psychiatric Disturbances ◽  
Late Stages

Many patients with Parkinson's Disease (PD) experience significant cognitive and mood impairment -even early in the course of the disease. These mental impairments are only partially responsive to levodopa treatment and are often as disabling as the motor impairment, particularly in mid and late stages of the disease. Investigators have recently begun a search for new agents that can effectively treat mental dysfunction of PD. Although there have been only a handful of properly controlled clinical trials of interventions targeted at amelioration of mental dysfunction in PD, progress has been made. Based on the available evidence, targeting catecholaminergic and cholinergic function may be an effective strategy for amelioration of cognitve, mood and psychiatric disturbances in PD.

scholarly journals Bringing Advanced Therapies for Parkinson’s Disease to the Clinic: The Scientist’s Perspective

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-6
Author(s):  
Mark Tomishima ◽  
Agnete Kirkeby
Keyword(s):  
Parkinson’S Disease ◽  
Parkinson's Disease ◽  
Clinical Trials ◽  
Phase I Clinical Trials ◽  
Preclinical Models ◽  
Preclinical Development ◽  
Dopaminergic Medication ◽  
Gene Therapies ◽  
Advanced Therapies ◽  
New Phase

After many years of preclinical development, cell and gene therapies have advanced from research tools in the lab to clinical-grade products for patients, and today they constitute more than a quarter of all new Phase I clinical trials for Parkinson’s disease. Whereas efficacy has been convincingly proven for many of these products in preclinical models, the field is now entering a new phase where the functionality and safety of these products will need to stand the test in clinical trials. If successful, these new products can have the potential to provide patients with a one-time administered treatment which may alleviate them from daily symptomatic dopaminergic medication.

Neuroprotective agents for clinical trials in Parkinson's disease: A systematic assessment

Neurology ◽  
2003 ◽  
Vol 60 (8) ◽  
pp. 1234-1240 ◽  
Author(s):  
B.M. Ravina ◽  
S.C. Fagan ◽  
R.G. Hart ◽  
C.A. Hovinga ◽  
D.D. Murphy ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Parkinson’S Disease ◽  
Parkinson's Disease ◽  
Clinical Trials ◽  
Neuroprotective Agents ◽  
Systematic Assessment

Parkinson's disease and convergence insufficiency: a mini-review

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 108-111
Author(s):  
Mashael Al-Namaeh
Keyword(s):  
Parkinson’S Disease ◽  
Parkinson's Disease ◽  
Clinical Trials ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Healthy Controls ◽  
Inclusion Criteria ◽  
Medline Search ◽  
Convergence Insufficiency ◽  
Eye Examination ◽  
The Relationship

Background: A key manifestation of Parkinson’s disease (PD) is visual impairment. Cognitive impairment has been found to overlap with convergence insufficiency (CI) in patients with PD and is associated with significantly greater near point convergence (NPC) distance. Difficulty in reading and diplopia were the most common symptoms of CI in PD. The prevalence of CI is greater among patients with PD. Therefore, this study aimed to assess the relationship between PD and CI. Methods: Studies that had included data on CI, NPC, or both were selected by searching PubMed/MEDLINE and clinicaltrails.gov, without any timeline or language limitation. The following terms were used in PubMed/MEDLINE search: ‘Clinical Trials’, ‘Parkinson’s Disease’, and ‘Convergence Insufficiency’. For clinical trials.gov database, the terms ‘Parkinson’s Disease’, ‘Convergence Insufficiency’, and ‘Completed Studies’ were used. Only those studies with control subjects were included. PubMed/MEDLINE search yielded 1,563 articles, but no article was found in the clinical trails.gov search. Twelve articles met the inclusion criteria, among which nine articles were selected as they had data on CI or NPC distance (cm), and PD.   Results: Overall, there were 1,563 articles; among them, 12 articles met the inclusion criteria. Nine articles were selected based on their data concerning CI or NPC distance (cm) and PD. Relative to the control group, the PD group had high CI. In addition, PD group showed increase in NPC distance than the control group. Conclusions: These data suggest that the patients with PD had an increased likelihood of developing CI visual symptoms, and increased NPC distance than healthy controls. These findings indicate that regular eye examination is very important for patients with PD.

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