Short Course of IVIG Slows Early Alzheimer’s
- By BSTQ Staff
Results from a new study in patients with early Alzheimer’s disease showed a short course of intravenous immune globulin (IVIG) slows the disease’s progression. Conducted at the Sutter Neuroscience Institute in Sacramento, Calif., the study hopes to replicate results of an earlier Phase 2 trial of IVIG in Alzheimer’s disease patients, but with a lower total dose of IVIG. In that trial, mild to moderate Alzheimer’s patients who received IVIG infusions every two to four weeks, beginning with a six-month randomized phase and continuing with a one-year open-label extension, experienced reduced brain atrophy and a near halt in their cognitive decline.
In this new study, patients with early Alzheimer’s disease who received five doses of IVIG showed significantly less brain atrophy after one year than a placebo group. One-year results from the first 28 patients in a planned two-year, placebo-controlled trial showed a 5.7 percent reduction from baseline in MRI-measured ventricular brain volume among the 14 receiving IVIG, compared with an 8.76 percent decline in the 14 assigned to placebo infusions. A total of 52 patients with mild cognitive impairment attributed to Alzheimer’s disease were enrolled in the study, although two dropped out before completing the eight-week course of IVIG therapy. Of the remaining 50 patients, the last to enroll had just recently finished dosing.
Because IVIG is derived from human donor plasma and is extremely scarce, production capabilities for all current suppliers could not begin to provide enough for all patients with mild to moderate Alzheimer’s disease — let alone the even larger population with mild cognitive impairment — should the treatment prove to be effective. Therefore, if a short-term dosing regimen is as effective as continuing therapy, it would stretch the existing supplies to cover a greater number of patients. The eight-week, five-dose schedule used in the new study is the same as that already used in several other neurological applications and could reasonably be expected to be beneficial, said Shawn Kile, MD, of Sutter Neuroscience Institute.
