Company Announces Parkinson's Breakthrough

Rexahn Pharmaceuticals.Rexahn’s goal is to be a world-class biopharmaceutical company developing and delivering novel cures for cancer and disorders of the central nervous system (CNS) to patients worldwide. Leveraging a powerful, multi-faceted discovery engine consisting of small signaling molecule discovery, computational modeling and nanotechnology-based drug targeting and delivery, we believe that we are well on our way to achieving our goal.
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Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Rexahn says study shows neuroprotective effects of clavulanic acid, main ingredient in Seradaxin drug

Clinical stage pharma company Rexahn Pharmaceuticals (NYSE Amex: RNN) said Tuesday that a published Drug Development Research article indicates that clavulanic acid, the active ingredient of the company's lead central nervous system drug Seradaxin, protects neurons from brain damage associated with neurodegnerative disease.

In the study, rodents that were exposed to different neurotoxins, were administered with clavulanic acid, which protected neurons in the hippocampus and dopaminergic regions of the brain that are critical in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease, respectively.

"The exciting neuronal protective properties of clavulanic acid make it a highly promising treatment for neuronal cell death diseases like Parkinson's and Alzheimer's," said Rexahn CEO Chang Ahn.

Parkinson's disease afflicts five million people worldwide, and with the aging of the baby boom generation, that population is expected to double by 2030.

According to the Alzheimer's Association, by 2050, the number of Americans aged 65 and older with Alzheimer's is projected to reach between 11 million and 16 million, unless medical breakthroughs can prevent or more effectively treat the disease.

Currently, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's therapies only provide symptomatic relief.

"Clavulanic acid has breakthrough potential of shielding the brain cell survival mechanisms, rather than fighting one-by-one the multitude of triggers that can activate the cell death mechanisms common in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's," added Ahn.

Alzheimer's has at least five major triggers, while Parkinson's has three major dysfunctioning mechanisms. Rather than intercepting and fighting each trigger, clavulanic acid has shown to broadly protect brain cell mechanisms.

Rexahn develops and commercializes therapeutics for cancer, CNS disorders, sexual dysfunction and other unmet medical needs. The company currently has three drug candidates in Phase II clinical trials, including Archexin, Serdaxin, and Zoraxel.

The company rallied more than 3% Tuesday morning, to trade at $1.24 on NYSE Amex Exchange.

THIS IS NOT A RECOMMENDATION TO BUY OR SELL THIS STOCK !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Caring For the Caregiver

Caring for a spouse, parent or other family member who is battling severe mental or physical illness is a labor of love, but one that has its own emotional toll.

Previous research has shown that untrained, primary caregivers who are looking after family face an increased possibility of several physical and psychological health issues—including an increased risk for depressive symptoms and declines in physical health, or feelings of guilt and anxiety should they give up some caregiver responsibilities. To help address these issues and alleviate some of these problems, researchers and mental health professionals have worked to devise intervention strategies to promote well being among caregivers.

Yet, according to new research published last month in the journal Aging & Mental Health, some of these efforts are designed on too narrow of criteria, and fail to account for the large range of stressors, and different combinations of risk factors, that can impact caregivers overall mental and physical health. In an effort to improve caregiver support, researchers at Pennsylvania State University and The Benjamin Rose Institute in Cleveland studied 67 individuals who provide primary care for family members with dementia, analyzing the different stressors that impacted their lives and how those factors influenced not only their loved one's care, but their own well being.


The study included individuals who served as the primary caregivers for relatives with dementia who were not residing in assisted-living facilities such as nursing homes. Researchers collected data by interviewing subjects in their homes for an average of two hours. Participants were asked about 15 different risk factors—from how much assistance they needed to provide their loved one in routine daily tasks such as bathing, dressing or grocery shopping to whether care for the family member with dementia had created broader family conflict.

Researchers found that, though all study subjects shared the common experience of caring for a relative with dementia, the way that this responsibility impacted their lives differed substantially for each person. That is, each risk factor associated with being a primary caregiver—from decreased leisure time and financial strain to anger or strife over the loss of companionship—influenced each individual differently, and in different combinations of varying severity. What's more, how these different factors influenced a caregiver's own mental health differed greatly among participants—while some showed increased signs of depression but didn't experience anger, while for others the emotional fallout was the opposite.

The researchers did find that while certain risk factors increased the likelihood of some outcomes—feeling overwhelmed or suffering worsening health—the total number of stressors had a greater influence on risk for poor mental and physical health outcomes among caregivers than any individual stressor, no matter how severely participants said it impacted them.

The study authors conclude that the findings indicate the need for intervention efforts specifically tailored to individual caregivers, and the combinations of risk factors that most impact them. They write: "For example, a caregiver who has a high rate of depressive symptoms and is in poor health may need a treatment approach that emphasizes relief from caregiving responsibilities. Another caregiver who has depressive symptoms but is in good health may benefit from interventions that increase his/her activity and involvement, such as learning new skills for managing stressors."

Yet recognizing that caregivers need intervention strategies that address their particular needs doesn't mean that there can't be a more systematic approach to developing these interventions, the authors argue. Developing a technique that allows mental health professionals to carefully assess the many, multi-level ways in which caregivers well being is impacted could help determine not only which individuals most need help, but also provide insight toward building "a multicomponent treatment program that can address the caregiver's specific risks and be modified to adapt to the caregiver's changing risk profile." In other words, use a more systematic approach to tailor a program that grows and develops to meet a caregivers changing emotional and psychological needs—so that they can not only nurture their ailing loved ones, but themselves as well.

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Can Brain Scans Detect Alzheimer's?

CHICAGO (Reuters) - People with a family history of Alzheimer's disease often have clumps of a toxic protein in their brains even though they are perfectly healthy, researchers said on Monday.

They said the findings could lead to new ways to identify people most likely to develop Alzheimer's disease, when there is still time to do something about it.

"The hope is to one day be able to diagnose very clearly the Alzheimer's disease process before any symptoms occur, when the brain is still healthy. Then the treatments would have the best chance of success," said Lisa Mosconi of New York University Langone Medical Center, whose study appears in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The team wants to continue to follow the people in the study to see whether they develop dementia, and they want to replicate the findings in a much larger study.

Several teams have been working on better ways to detect early-stage Alzheimer's disease in hopes of developing drugs that can fight it before it causes too much damage.

Current treatments cannot reverse the course of Alzheimer's, a mind-robbing form of dementia that affects more than 26 million people globally.

Mosconi's team used an imaging technique called positron emission tomography or PET with a fluorescent dye called Pittsburgh Compound B that lights up clumps of a protein called beta amyloid that are a hallmark of Alzheimer's disease.

The team imaged the brains of 42 people with an average age of 65, all with healthy brain function. Of these, 14 people had mothers who had Alzheimer's; 14 had fathers with the disease; and 14 had parents with healthy brain function.

Brain scans of all 42 showed that those whose parents -- either fathers or mothers -- had Alzheimer's were more likely to have amyloid plaques in their brains.

This was especially true of people whose mothers had Alzheimer's.

"They have pretty much 20 percent more amyloid beta deposits in their brains. In other words, they had an almost four times greater risk for amyloid beta pathology," Mosconi said in a telephone interview.

The finding confirms other studies that suggest having a mother with Alzheimer's may be a greater risk factor.

"It looks like if you have maternal history of Alzheimer's disease, the risk of amyloid beta plaque and a reduction in brain activity is much greater as compared to having a father affected," Mosconi said.

After advanced age, a family history of Alzheimer's is the single biggest risk factor for developing the disease.

Not everyone who has beta amyloid plaques in their brain develops Alzheimer's disease, but Mosconi said having the plaques does increase the risk.

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Can The Right Diet Prevent Alzheimer's?

A diet rich in fruits and vegetables as well as omega-3 fatty acids may not only be good for your heart -- it may also reduce the risk of developing Alzheimer's disease.
(Iconica/Getty Images)Looking at more than 2,000 dementia-free adults ages 65 and older, researchers revealed that persons who consumed a Mediterranean-type diet regularly were 38 percent less likely to develop Alzheimer's disease over the next four years, according to Dr. Nikolaos Scarmeas of Columbia University in New York and colleagues.

The findings were published online in the journal Archives of Neurology.

The dietary pattern is characterized by eating more salad dressing, nuts, tomatoes, fish, poultry, cruciferous vegetables, fruits, and dark and green leafy vegetables and lesser quantities of red meat, organ meat, butter, and high-fat dairy products.

"Our findings provide support for further exploration of food combination-based dietary behavior for the prevention of this important public health problem," Scarmeas and colleagues wrote.

A Mediterranean-style diet has already been linked to improved cardiovascular health, and this latest study joins a growing literature linking diet and Alzheimer's disease, according to the researchers.

Scarmeas and his colleagues reported in 2006 that the Mediterranean diet, characterized by high intakes of fruits, vegetables, and cereals and low intakes of meat and dairy products, lowered Alzheimer's disease risk in participants in the Washington Heights-Inwood Columbia Aging Project (WHICAP).

Commenting on the study, Dr. David Knopman of the Mayo Clinic questioned whether it added much to previous analyses by Scarmeas' group, pointing out that the current study used the same data set in the same population.

"What's really needed are more instances of validation in independent populations," he told MedPage Today.

In an e-mail, Dr. Samuel Gandy of Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York said what the diet identified in this study shares with other diets linked to decreased Alzheimer's disease risk is that it is heart healthy.

"This may explain their apparent ability to reduce the risk of Alzheimer's, since heart disease increases the risk for Alzheimer's disease," he said.

"In any event, the diets do no harm and may have some benefits, hence their frequent recommendation by physicians," he wrote, noting that proof of which foods and the appropriate quantities have effects on disease risk remain to be clarified.

In the current study, the researchers further explored dietary patterns in this cohort of Medicare beneficiaries living in northern Manhattan.

Seven different dietary patterns emerged based on their ability to explain the variation in seven nutrients most often reported in previous studies to be related either positively or inversely to Alzheimer's disease risk.

The nutrients were saturated fatty acids, monounsaturated fatty acids, omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, omega-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids, vitamin E, vitamin B12, and folate.

Through an average follow-up of nearly four years, 253 of the participants developed Alzheimer's disease.

Only one of the dietary patterns evaluated was associated with Alzheimer's disease risk, after adjustment for demographic factors, smoking, body mass index, caloric intake, comorbidities and genetic risk factors.

The diet, which was rich in omega-3 and omega-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids, vitamin E, and folate but poor in saturated fatty acids and vitamin B12, was similar to the Mediterranean diet.

Although the study could not prove a causal relationship, Scarmeas and his colleagues said that there are several ways the diet could protect against Alzheimer's disease.

Folate reduces circulating homocysteine levels, vitamin E has a strong antioxidant effect, and "fatty acids may be related to dementia and cognitive function through atherosclerosis, thrombosis, or inflammation via an effect on brain development and membrane functioning or via accumulation of beta-amyloid," they wrote.

"It may also be that eating healthy is a marker for other factors such as education, intellect, and income, which may be protective," said Dr. George Grossberg of St. Louis University.

Dr. Steven DeKosky, vice president and dean of the University of Virginia School of Medicine in Charlottesville, said there are several unknowns regarding the relationship between diet and Alzheimer's disease risk.

"At an individual level, we don't know how powerful an effect the foods might have on suppressing expression of Alzheimer's disease, or how long you would have to eat them to have an effect, or what interactions of nutrition or individuals' genes may occur and affect risk," DeKosky said.

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