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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowIndianapolis-based Eli Lilly and Co.’s experimental drug for schizophrenia did not prove in its latest test that it works better than existing medication, the company announced today.
The drug showed promise in an early study two years ago, but Lilly said the drug performed inconclusively in a Phase II clinical trial. The drug maker said it would test the drug in another clinical trial next year in hopes of better results.
The company said the delay would not change the company’s earnings guidance, either for this year or the longer term. But the test results are a setback.
“It was certainly a disappointment,” said Lilly spokeswoman Christine Van Marter. “We spent lots of time and money on this clinical trial.”
An earlier test of the drug, called LY2140023, had shown that it worked quickly and safely without weight gain, a side effect of Lilly’s top-selling anti-psychotic drug Zyprexa. Patients who took the drug in the earlier trial showed no weight gain, and they didn’t have other adverse effects such as involuntary movements or muscle stiffness.
In the latest trial, Lilly tested the drug on 393 patients for four weeks. The drug did not do better than Zyprexa or a placebo, the company said.
Lilly said it could not draw any conclusions from the results, and said inconclusive clinical trials are common in the field on neuroscience.
The new drug is designed to work in a different way than current medications. Most anti-psychotic drugs work by affecting the neurotransmitter dopamine or serotonin, but the new drug is thought to work by affecting another neurotransmitter, glutamate.
Zyprexa is Lilly’s best-selling drug, and sales topped $4 billion last year. The drug will lose its patent protection in 2011, meaning other drug companies can begin selling cheaper, generic versions of the drug.
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