Data from an early phase clinical trial of a drug being developed for adults living with schizophrenia was published December 15 in The Lancet.
John H. Krystal, MD, Robert L. McNeil, Jr. Professor of Translational Research and professor of psychiatry, of neuroscience, and of psychology, and chair of the Yale Department of Psychiatry, is first author of the study of the drug emraclidine, developed by Cerevel Therapeutics.
In the Phase 1b trial, both treatment groups of emraclidine (assessing 30 mg once daily and 20 mg twice daily) demonstrated clinically meaningful and statistically significant improvements in assessments of symptom severity (Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS) total score) and emraclidine was generally well-tolerated compared with placebo after six weeks of treatment.
“We believe the data … supports the potential of emraclidine to be an important treatment option with a novel mechanism of action for people living with schizophrenia,” Krystal said. “Emraclidine demonstrated clinically meaningful and statistically significant antipsychotic effects with no meaningful differences in gastrointestinal adverse effects, extrapyramidal symptoms or weight gain compared with placebo.”
Cerevel has initiated its Phase 2 development program evaluating emraclidine in schizophrenia.