QR Pharma to present clinical data from mechanism of action study in MCI patients at ICAD 2010

QR Pharma, Inc., a developer of novel drugs to treat Alzheimer's disease (AD), announced today that it has been accepted to present a poster on clinical data from its recent mechanism of action study in mild cognitive impaired (MCI) patients at the International Congress on Alzheimer's Disease (ICAD 2010).

Hot Topic Poster Session, Poster # P4 -107 on July 14, 2010, between 11:30 AM and 1:00 PM, ICAD, Honolulu, Hawaii.

Posiphen® is in clinical development as an oral treatment for Alzheimer's disease (AD). It is a small orally active compound with high blood brain barrier permeability, which lowers amyloid-β precursor protein (APP) levels. In cell cultures, normal, transgenic and trisomic mice Posiphen reduces the rate of synthesis of APP.

APP is cleaved into a number of toxic peptides, one of them being amyloid-β₄₂ (Aβ42), the others being cleaved from the N- and C- terminal ends. These peptides attack multiple pathways of neuronal cell life leading to synaptic loss and nerve cell death. This induces dysfunction, neuroinflammation, and leads to cognitive impairment and neurodegeneration.

We conducted a trial in MCI patients to confirm this mechanism of action (reduced rate of APP synthesis) in humans and correlate it with the pharmacokinetics of the drug and its metabolites in CSF and plasma. This study evaluates the activity of Posiphen and its metabolites in the CSF of patients with MCI and their relationship to central and peripheral pharmacokinetic parameters.