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Biotech / Medical : Regeneron Pharmaceuticals -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Miljenko Zuanic who wrote (460)	8/16/2000 6:56:21 PM
From: Miljenko Zuanic	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 3559

BDNF and NT3 article in Gastroenterology: Neurotrophic Factors Stimulate Gut Motility in Humans -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WESTPORT, Aug 16 (Reuters Health) - Recombinant human neurotrophic factors accelerate colonic transit and relieve constipation, according to a report published in the July issue of Gastroenterology. Patients treated with recombinant human brain-derived neurotrophic factor (r-metHuBDNF) for various neurodegenerative disorders commonly reported altered bowel function, suggesting that r-metHuBDNF may have gastrointestinal actions that parallel its central nervous system effects, the authors explain. Dr. Michael Camilleri, of the Mayo Clinic, in Rochester, Minnesota, and colleagues measured gastrointestinal transit and collected bowel movement diaries from 40 healthy subjects and 10 patients with constipation treated with subcutaneous r-metHuBDNF or sc recombinant human neurotrophic factor 3 (r-metHuNT-3). Compared with placebo treatment, r-metHuBDNF significantly accelerated colonic transit at 24 hours and 48 hours, the authors report. Gastric emptying and small intestine transit were not significantly affected. Stool frequency increased by 2.5 the first week and by 3.5 the second week of r-metHuBDNF treatment, the investigators note, compared with 0.75 and 0.77, respectively, for placebo treatment. Stool consistency and ease of passage did not change significantly with treatment. Injection-site reactions, arthralgia, and myalgia were reported more commonly among r-metHuBDNF-treated patients than among placebo-treated patients, the report indicates, but no serious adverse events were encountered and no participant withdrew from the study. Similar results were obtained with r-metHuNT-3, the researchers report. In addition, r-metHuNT-3 accelerated gastric emptying and small intestine transit. It also increased the ease of stool passage, but only in constipated patients. "The present studies are the first to show that exogenous neurotrophic factors, r-metHuBDNF and r-metHuNT-3, accelerate colonic transit and increase stool frequency in humans," the authors write. They conclude "that recombinant human neurotrophins are promising agents capable of modifying transit in the entire gastrointestinal tract." In a related commentary, Drs. Jan Tack and Pieter Vanden Berghe from University of Leuven, Belgium, agree. "Treatment with neurotrophins might be of particular interest in patients with intestinal neurodegenerative disorders," they write. "It is conceivable," they add, "that several of the so-called functional bowel disorders may be the symptomatic outcome of malfunction of the neurologic organization with the enteric nervous system." Gastroenterology 2000;119:41-50,257-260.