GenoMed, Inc. Finds Many More Disease Targets for Its ACE Inhibitor Treatment Regimen
GenoMed, Inc. Finds Many More Disease Targets for Its ACE Inhibitor Treatment Regimen
ST. LOUIS--(June 27, 2002) - GenoMed, Inc- ("the Company" or "GenoMed") (National Quotation Bureau’s Pink Sheets Symbol GMED), a St. Louis, Missouri-based medical genomics biotechnology company, announced today that it has answers to many of the questions suggested by Mary Duenwald in her New York Times article of June 25, 2002, “Familiar Blood Pressure Drugs Find an Array of Novel Uses”
New York Times Story
The article reported that ACE inhibitors might be like aspirin, with uses for many more diseases than originally thought. Why this should be so is still unknown, according to the article. GenoMed believes that it has many of the missing pieces of this large and exciting puzzle.
GenoMed thinks it knows which common diseases will benefit from use of ACE inhibitors, based on genotyping 6,414 Caucasian and African American hospital patients and 3,959 kidney dialysis patients for the ACE deletion/deletion genotype. The results are to be published later this year, and predict which diseases should benefit from ACE inhibition. They include complications of high blood pressure and diabetes in both Caucasians and African Americans, some of which were mentioned in the New York Times article, such as stroke, heart attack, and heart failure, and some which were not, such as kidney failure, diabetic eye disease (diabetic retinopathy), diabetic nerve disease (diabetic neuropathy), and peripheral vascular disease.
Additional diseases which GenoMed has found which may benefit from ACE inhibition include unrelated diseases like glaucoma, degenerative joint disease (“osteoarthritis”), and emphysema. Common psychiatric diseases such as bipolar affective disorder (manic depression), depression, and schizophrenia may also benefit.
In addition, basal cell skin cancer, which is the most common cancer among Caucasians, as well as cancers of the lung, prostate, colon, head and neck, and bladder, may benefit from ACE inhibition, especially if given preventively. Less common solid cancers such as cancer of the kidney and pancreas, and lymphoma and chronic leukemia also appear likely to benefit from preventive treatment with an ACE inhibitor.
All of these diseases were found to have an ACE D/D frequency higher than among “control” patients. The strength of this association varied somewhat by ethnicity and gender, leaving open the possibility that clinical outcomes may also vary according to ethnicity and gender, as GenoMed has already found in a small number of diseases.
GenoMed has found that a higher than conventional dose of a particular ACE inhibitor yielded superior clinical outcomes for male patients with chronic renal failure due to high blood pressure or type 2 diabetes, as well as a smaller number of patients with peripheral vascular disease and emphysema. Paradoxically, African American patients with diabetic kidney disease did better than Caucasian patients, which runs counter to the prevailing “wisdom” about ACE inhibitors. These results are to be published in the August/September issue of Diabetes Technology and Therapeutics.
GenoMed has applied for patents on these treatment regimens, which will serve as the starting point for the Company to extend its results to the additional diseases mentioned above.
The Company has also developed a hypothesis for how ACE may be involved in these many different diseases. According to David Moskowitz, MD, Chairman of GenoMed, “The ACE deletion/deletion genotype reveals a kind of ‘Mississippi River’ connecting many common human diseases. Seemingly unrelated diseases like cardiovascular disease, psychiatric disease, and cancer are actually related to one another through sharing excess activity of the ACE enzyme. ACE appears to be the starting point or ‘headwaters’ of a common disease pathway leading to most common human (and animal) diseases. This knowledge raises the possibility that many common diseases could be delayed or perhaps prevented altogether with the right dose of the right ACE inhibitor taken for the right length of time. Since all of these diseases are associated with aging, this treatment may combat aging itself.”
GenoMed has applied for patents on the above material, and is actively enrolling physicians and patients in the U.S. and abroad to use its Clinical Outcomes Improvement Machine™, based on its discoveries.
About GenoMed
GenoMed, Inc. is a medical genomics company whose mission is to improve patient outcomes by identifying the genes that cause disease. A recent St. Louis Business Journal article
Business Journal Story
reported that the company has applied for patents based on its finding that the ACE gene is associated with nearly 40 common, age-related diseases. The Company has filed patent applications on its new treatments for both human and veterinary use. A video version of the company’s treatment results for chronic kidney failure is available at
Video News Release
Consistent with the Company’s goal to improve patient outcomes globally, GenoMed is currently working to license its treatments to physicians and healthcare systems worldwide. GenoMed recently held a press conference at La Clinica Health Center (3646 Fairview Ave., St. Louis, MO; tel. 314-664-5565) in, May 2002 to discuss licensing the same treatment to La Clinica for its Hispanic population, who have a 50% prevalence rate of diabetes. GenoMed also recently announced that it is holding discussions with large physician organizations located in the Midwestern and Southwestern United States as part of its strategy to work directly with physicians to deliver its unique treatments to patients. The Company is also discussing a collaboration with an outcomes management company to capture patient outcomes accurately.
For questions, please contact Krissy Fischer, tel. 1-877-GENOMED, FAX 314-977-0042, email: kfischer@genomedics.comor visit GenoMed at www.genomedics.com. |
