Danderyd Hospital AB

For heart attack patients, treating only the coronary artery that caused the infarction works just as well as preventive balloon dilation of the other coronary arteries, according to a new large study. For heart attack patients, treating only the coronary artery that caused the infarction works just as well as preventive balloon dilation of the other coronary arteries, according to a new large study by researchers at Karolinska Institutet and others. The results are published in the New England Journal of Medicine. Heart attack is a common disease with risks of serious complications. It has long been unclear what the best strategy is for treating narrowings in coronary arteries separate from the specific vessel that caused the infarction. A new large Swedish study has investigated whether it is sufficient to treat only the coronary artery that caused the infarction, or whether long-term results are better if other narrowed vessels are also treated with balloon dilation as a preventive measure. The clinical randomized study included 1542 patients from 32 hospitals in 7 countries. In the Swedish part, the SWEDEHEART registry was used to conduct the randomization and collect data. Patients were followed up for five years after the procedure. The results show no difference between the groups in terms of new heart attacks, new unplanned balloon dilations or the total number of all-cause deaths. "This is somewhat surprising. Our hypothesis was that it would be beneficial to do preventive angioplasty," says Felix Böhm, a senior physician at the Department of Clinical Sciences, Danderyd Hospital at Karolinska Institutet, who led the study. However, when it comes to problems with angina, the study shows that it is possible to avoid patients coming back for new balloon dilations through preventive treatment. According to Felix Böhm, this suggests that we should still aim for complete treatment of all vessels. "But for those patients where there is some circumstance that makes a complete revascularization complicated, one might choose to wait, since there was no difference in the most serious complications -- new heart attack and death," says Felix Böhm. If problems with angina occur, these patients can then come back later for a new treatment, according to Felix Böhm. "A positive finding of the study was that most patients do not come back with new problems, regardless of the treatment strategy chosen. "Nowadays, heart attack patients are so well treated with drugs that it is difficult to find other interventions that provide further significant risk reduction," says Felix Böhm. The researchers will now go on to investigate how angina and other quality of life parameters in the patients were affected by the different treatment strategies, as well as health economic aspects of the chosen strategy. The research was conducted by Uppsala Clinical Research Center (UCR) at Uppala University. The legal sponsor was Karolinska University Hospital. The study was funded by the Swedish Research Council, Hjärt-Lungfonden, Region Stockholm, Abbott and Boston Scientific. The companies had no influence on study design, results analysis or article writing.

GOTHENBURG, SWEDEN / ACCESSWIRE / February 20, 2023 / IRLAB Therapeutics (STO:IRLAB-A)(FRA:6IRA) Gothenburg, Sweden, February 13, 2023 - IRLAB Therapeutics AB (Nasdaq Stockholm: IRLAB A), a company discovering and developing novel treatments for Parkinson's disease, today announced that its CEO Richard Godfrey is leaving his position and that the Board of directors has appointed Gunnar Olsson as Interim CEO. Gunnar Olsson is currently Chairman of the Board of IRLAB but will now transition to a position as a Board director. The Board of directors has appointed the company's current Vice Chairman, Carola Lemne, as its new Chairman. All changes will be implemented immediately and the process to recruit a permanent CEO will start immediately. "The Board has reached the conclusion that a change of CEO is in the best interest of the company. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Richard for his contributions and wish him every success in the future. With strong support from IRLAB's management team and other employees, I will now lead the company until a permanent CEO is in place," says IRLAB's Chairman of the Board and incoming Interim CEO, Gunnar Olsson. "I look forward to leading the work of the Board during the exciting time ahead for IRLAB. We are in the midst of an in-depth analysis of all the data generated in the Phase 2b study of mesdopetam, and later this year the drug candidate IRL757 is expected to be ready for a Phase 1 clinical trial. In the first half of 2024, we expect to both present the results from the Phase 2b study of pirepemat and initiate the first clinical study of yet another of our drug candidates, IRL942. Furthermore, we have now started the development of an entirely new class of Parkinson's drugs, with drug candidate IRL1117 at the forefront," says Carola Lemne, incoming Chairman of the Board of IRLAB. Gunnar Olsson (b. 1953) was elected to IRLAB's Board of Directors in 2017 and has been Chairman of the Board since 2020. He is a licensed physician, holds a Ph.D., and is a specialist in cardiology and internal medicine. Between 1998 and 2010, he was an adjunct professor at the Department of Medicine at Karolinska Institutet. Gunnar Olsson is also an honorary Doctor of Medicine at the University of Gothenburg. He has more than 30 years of experience in leading positions in the life science industry. He has been Vice President & Head of Cardiovascular and Gastrointestinal Therapy Areas in Global R&D at AstraZeneca and has served on several boards of biotech companies and the European Society of Cardiology. Details of current board assignments are available on the company's website. Carola Lemne (b. 1958) was elected to IRLAB's Board of Directors in 2018 and is the company's Vice Chairman. She is a licensed physician, Doctor of Medicine and associate professor, and has a background as CEO of the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise and Danderyd University Hospital as well as CEO of Praktikertjänst AB, clinical research manager and head of global strategic drug development and regulatory strategy at Pharmacia Corp. She has held board positions in Getinge, Apoteket, Alecta, MEDA, Investor and AFA Försäkringar and has also been a board member of, among others, the Foundation for Strategic Research, the State Delegation for Clinical Research, the Research Institute of Industrial Economics and the Swedish Corporate Governance Board, as well as Chair of Uppsala University. Details of current board assignments are available on the company's website. For more information Gunnar Olsson, interim CEO Phone: +46 70 576 14 02 E-mail: gunnar.olsson@irlab.se Viktor Siewertz, CFO Phone: +46 727 10 70 70 E-mail: viktor.siewertz@irlab.se This information is information that IRLAB Therapeutics is obliged to make public pursuant to the EU Market Abuse Regulation. The information was submitted for publication, through the agency of the contact persons set out above, at 2023-02-20 17:45 CET. About IRLAB IRLAB discovers and develops novel treatments of Parkinson's disease and other CNS disorders. The company's most advanced drug candidates, mesdopetam (IRL790) and pirepemat (IRL752), are in Phase IIb and are designed to treat some of the most difficult symptoms related to Parkinson's. In 2021, Ipsen, a specialty pharma company, acquired exclusive global rights to the development and commercialization of mesdopetam. IRLAB has discovered and generated all its drug candidates and continues to discover innovative drug candidates for the treatment of CNS disorders through its proprietary systems biology-based Integrative Screening Process (ISP) research platform. In addition to IRLAB's strong clinical pipeline, the company is also progressing three preclinical programs, IRL942, IRL757, and IRL1117, towards Phase I studies. IRLAB is listed on Nasdaq Stockholm. More information on . Attachments IRLAB changes CEO and appoints new Chairman SOURCE: IRLAB Therapeutics View source version on accesswire.com:

Patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) treated with the drug rituximab had a significantly lower risk of relapse compared with MS patients receiving standard treatment, according to results from a phase 3 clinical trial in Sweden. Patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) treated with the drug rituximab had a significantly lower risk of relapse compared with MS patients receiving standard treatment. This has been shown in a phase 3 clinical trial by researchers at Karolinska Institutet and Danderyd Hospital in Sweden published in The Lancet Neurology. Rituximab is not approved as an MS drug, but has proven to be effective in smaller studies and is therefore largely prescribed "off label." The Phase 3 clinical trial is a multicentre study involving 195 patients from 17 hospitals in Sweden newly diagnosed with the most common form of MS, relapsing-remitting MS. Patients were randomly given either rituximab (Mabthera) or standard dimethyl fumarate (Tecfidera) treatment. During the 24-month follow-up, the occurrence of relapses, i.e., a temporary deterioration of the disease state, was investigated. The results showed that those treated with rituximab had a five-fold lower risk of relapse. Only three out of 98 patients who received rituximab suffered relapses, compared to 16 out of 97 patients who received dimethyl fumarate. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) also showed that those who received rituximab had fewer new MS plaques, i.e., areas of damage or scarring in the central nervous system. No increased risk of adverse effects with rituximab was observed. "The excellent efficacy and low cost of rituximab could make it an attractive first choice for newly diagnosed MS patients, not least in resource-poor areas. But more and larger studies are needed to confirm the drug's efficacy, long-term safety and cost-effectiveness for MS," says the study's first author Anders Svenningsson, adjunct professor at the Department of Clinical Sciences, Danderyd Hospital, Karolinska Institutet and chief physician at the neurology clinic at Danderyd Hospital. Rituximab is used for a variety of medical conditions but is not approved for the treatment of MS because there has been a lack of data from phase 3 clinical trials. However, the drug has been shown to have a good effect on relapsing-remitting MS and is therefore often prescribed off label, which means that the treating doctor alone assumes responsibility for the treatment. "Since the patent has expired, there is no incentive from the pharmaceutical company holding the marketing rights to apply for a new indication. But now, in addition to accumulated clinical experience, we also have the documentation that is usually required to apply for an indication. Our study is an important step on the way for rituximab to become an approved MS drug," says Anders Svenningsson. The study was funded by the Swedish Research Council. Several of the authors have listed potential conflicts of interest, see the scientific article for a full list. Anders Svenningsson has served on the data safety monitoring board of GeNeuro. Co-author and KI researcher Fredrik Piehl has received research grants from the pharmaceutical companies Janssen, Merck KGaA and UCB, as well as fees for serving on data monitoring committees in clinical trials with Chugai, Lundbeck and Roche.