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Genentech has announced positive results from two studies evaluating ocrelizumab for people with relapsing multiple sclerosis (MS).

The studies (called OPERA I and OPERA II) met their primary and major secondary endpoints..... Read More - http://www.ms-uk.org/ocrelizumab

MSUK wrote:Genentech has announced positive results from two studies evaluating ocrelizumab for people with relapsing multiple sclerosis (MS).

The studies (called OPERA I and OPERA II) met their primary and major secondary endpoints..... Read More - http://www.ms-uk.org/ocrelizumab

Isn't this drug one that belongs to the monoclonal anti-body (?) group? Isn't this sort of similar to what Tysabri is? I sure hope they test this a lot more than they did with Tysabri.

MSbro wrote:

MSUK wrote:Genentech has announced positive results from two studies evaluating ocrelizumab for people with relapsing multiple sclerosis (MS).

The studies (called OPERA I and OPERA II) met their primary and major secondary endpoints..... Read More - http://www.ms-uk.org/ocrelizumab

Isn't this drug one that belongs to the monoclonal anti-body (?) group? Isn't this sort of similar to what Tysabri is? I sure hope they test this a lot more than they did with Tysabri.

It was in the clinical trials for 5-7 years as far as I know with more than 1700 patient (if we count p2 and p3 trials aswell) and safety profile was quite good so far (according to the news but of course we will have to see the final results in public). It targers different part of the immune system than Tysabri:

http://www.msdiscovery.org/research-res ... crelizumab
http://www.msdiscovery.org/research-res ... atalizumab

Similar drug on the market is Rituximab, actually I seen somewhere that it is the "humanized" version of rituximab:
http://www.msdiscovery.org/research-res ... -rituximab

Compared to rituximab (which also targets B cells and CD20), binds to a different (but overlapping) epitope of the large extracellular loop of CD20

We will know more after they present more data this year with the result of the ppms study.

EricDrake wrote:

MSbro wrote:

MSUK wrote:Genentech has announced positive results from two studies evaluating ocrelizumab for people with relapsing multiple sclerosis (MS).

The studies (called OPERA I and OPERA II) met their primary and major secondary endpoints..... Read More - http://www.ms-uk.org/ocrelizumab

Isn't this drug one that belongs to the monoclonal anti-body (?) group? Isn't this sort of similar to what Tysabri is? I sure hope they test this a lot more than they did with Tysabri.

It was in the clinical trials for 5-7 years as far as I know with more than 1700 patient (if we count p2 and p3 trials aswell) and safety profile was quite good so far (according to the news but of course we will have to see the final results in public). It targers different part of the immune system than Tysabri:

http://www.msdiscovery.org/research-res ... crelizumab
http://www.msdiscovery.org/research-res ... atalizumab

Similar drug on the market is Rituximab, actually I seen somewhere that it is the "humanized" version of rituximab:
http://www.msdiscovery.org/research-res ... -rituximab

Compared to rituximab (which also targets B cells and CD20), binds to a different (but overlapping) epitope of the large extracellular loop of CD20

We will know more after they present more data this year with the result of the ppms study.

Thanks for the info Eric.

I have read several posts about Tysabri on this board and learned that it too appeared to have good safety data. I believe they were able to get the FDA to approve it sooner than normal and then all hell broke loose when PML showed up. Even one of its founders cautioned about using this drug but that didn't stop its quick approval.

I'm very cautious about medications that start changing the way your immune system operates. Fix one thing and several other problems start occurring. Makes treating MS so difficult and is another reason my brother is dead against any drugs at this time.

I agree that it is not a good solution but until we dont have a better sight in MS this is the "best". I can understand your brothers fear, I have also been recently diagnosed (i had an mri in january with some lesion in my brain one of them was active and i had one last week and they made now a spine mri too where they found 5 active lesions but no active in brain now, but luckily so far all of them seems to be in a "good spot" because they cause only minor tingling in my hand and minor lhermitte sign). since january I added all kind of vitamin supplement to my diet b vitamins d vitamin tried to reduce gluten etc but still these lesions developed, however i was under a big stress in this month so probably it could also help them to develope, anyway I think I will swtich to a DMD now because supplements simply does not seem to be able to stop it alone and I feel that I cant take risk that I havent tried at least 1 or 2 which seems to be have a good safety profile (natalizumab is not one of them ofc).

EricDrake wrote:I agree that it is not a good solution but until we dont have a better sight in MS this is the "best". I can understand your brothers fear, I have also been recently diagnosed (i had an mri in january with some lesion in my brain one of them was active and i had one last week and they made now a spine mri too where they found 5 active lesions but no active in brain now, but luckily so far all of them seems to be in a "good spot" because they cause only minor tingling in my hand and minor lhermitte sign). since january I added all kind of vitamin supplement to my diet b vitamins d vitamin tried to reduce gluten etc but still these lesions developed, however i was under a big stress in this month so probably it could also help them to develope, anyway I think I will swtich to a DMD now because supplements simply does not seem to be able to stop it alone and I feel that I cant take risk that I havent tried at least 1 or 2 which seems to be have a good safety profile (natalizumab is not one of them ofc).

I sympathize with the situation that you and all MS patients find themselves. If only someone could discover what the mechanism(s) is that causes MS to start up. Hopefully one of these days it will happen but there's been little if any success for the past 50 years in all the research that they have done. The only benefactors so far have been the drug companies who sell their hideously expensive drugs which don't do all that much for MS patients.