This morning Reuter's is running a corrected story on Rezulin's potential (they are excluding PFE as a European distributor):
CORRECTED-Drug may prevent some diabetes -
researcher
In July 22 HELSINKI story headlined..."Drug may prevent some
diabetes - researcher" pls read in fourth para...Troglitazone,
marketed by Warner-Lambert Co in the United States and by
Sankyo and Glaxo-Wellcome Plc in Europe, helps improve
the body's sensitivity to insulin...instead of...
Troglitazone, marketed by Warner-Lambert Co in the United
States by Pfizer Inc and by Glaxo-Wellcome Plc
in Europe, helps improve the body's sensitivity to insulin
(makes clear that Pfizer is not involved in marketing
Troglitazone).
A corrected version will follow.
By Maggie Fox
HELSINKI, July 22, (Reuter) - A new diabetes drug offers
"dramatic" results and could actually prevent the disease in
patients at risk, reseachers said on Tuesday.
The new drug, troglitazone, helps diabetics regulate their
blood sugar and blood fat levels -- two of the main problems in
diabetes.
Jerrold Olefsky of the University of California, San Diego,
said Sankyo Co<4501.T> Ltd's drug, marketed under the names
Noscal and Rezulin, also seemed to help people with pre-diabetic
symptoms from getting any worse.
"We are not talking about making things better -- we are
talking about making things right," Olefsky told a news
conference.
Troglitazone, marketed by Warner-Lambert Co in the
United States and by Sankyo and Glaxo-Wellcome Plc in
Europe, helps improve the body's sensitivity to insulin.
It is the first in a new class of drugs known as
thiazolidinediones, which reduce insulin resistance. Olefsky,
one of the first clinicians to test the drug for Japan's Sankyo,
says insulin resistance is reponsible for most cases of type-two
diabetes, known as non-insulin dependent diabetes (NIDDM).
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) earlier this year
licensed troglitazone for use in diabetic patients who are not
responding well to standard insulin or drug therapy.
John Nolan of St James's Hospital and Trinity College in
Dublin said research on such patients -- usually middle-aged and
overweight -- showed it worked well in combination with either
insulin or standard sulphonylurea. Some patients were able to
reduce their insulin dose by 40 percent.
For some patients, Olefsky said this meant going from four
insulin injections a day to just one. Fifteen percent could stop
insulin altogether.
"There is nothing in the diabetes world that does this,"
Nolan told a news briefing.
Used alone, troglitazone worked "extremely well" in some
patients, Nolan said.
Robert Heine, head of the Diabetes Research Group at
University Hospital in Amsterdam, said perhaps it lowered
demands on the pancreatic beta-cells that produce insulin, so
over time they recovered from the strain of diabetes and were
able to produce more insulin.
The drug takes some time to work, Olefsky said. It takes at
least three months of treatment to show full effects.
"In most patients, sulphonylurea doesn't work adequately,"
Olefsky said. When troglitazone was added to their regime,
results were "pretty dramatic," he said.
"I think this will turn out to be the most common treatment
for diabetes," Olefsky predicted.
He said 85 percent of patients with high blood sugar -- not
high enough to cause the damage associated with diabetes but an
indicator of diabetes risk -- had normal levels after taking
troglitazone.
The U.S. National Institutes of Health were so impressed, he
said that they started a study of 4,000 patients. The seven-year
study is in its third year. "In 2002 we're going to know whether
we can prevent diabetes," Olefsky said.
The World Health Organisation said 135 million people have
diabetes, but said this will balloon to 300 million by 2025.
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