The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Center for Drug Evaluation Research (CDER) has issued a draft guidance to help sponsors develop new drugs to treat the early stages of Lyme disease.   The draft addresses criteria for clinical trial enrollment, efficacy endpoints, and clinical microbiology considerations for treating early stages of the disease when manifested by erythema migrans (EM), a rash that is often one of the first symptoms.   In North America, Lyme...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has now published four draft guidances spelling out how it will consider real-world data (RWD) in regulatory decision-making, from the use of electronic health records and registries to RWD in non-interventional studies. More guidance documents are planned, including details on study designs that incorporate RWD for external control arms.   External control arms, which use data collected outside of the current trial to provide ...

Developing therapies for rare diseases involves complex incentives, unique requirements, and often extensive patient engagement. The authors of RAPS’ Orphan Drug Development for Rare Diseases , Sundar Ramanan, PhD, MBA, and Sunny Kamlesh Dave, MPharm, recently took time to discuss with RAPS Senior Editor Gloria Hall the importance of orphan drugs, the peculiarities and challenges of obtaining an orphan drug designation (ODD), and what is covered in the book. During a “m...

Two federal agencies are partnering with pharmaceutical companies and non-profit organizations to form a consortium aimed at boosting the development of gene therapies for rare diseases.   In a Wednesday announcement, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) revealed the launch of the Bespoke Gene Therapy Consortium (BGTC). The consortium’s work will be managed by the Foundation for the NIH and sit within the NIH Acceleratin...

Craig Martin is chief executive officer of Global Genes, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to increase public awareness for rare disease and globally connect, empower and educate individuals and rare disease foundations in person, print and online. More than 400 million people worldwide are affected by 7,000+ rare diseases. In the U.S., around 1 in 10 people (more than 33 million Americans) have a rare condition. More than half of rare disease patients are chi...

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on Monday announced the approval of Biogen’s human monoclonal antibody Aduhelm (aducanumab) for use in patients with Alzheimer’s disease under the agency’s accelerated approval pathway.   FDA’s approval of aducanumab is based on results from two Phase 3 clinical trials of patients with early Alzheimer’s disease (AD), EMERGE and ENGAGE . Both trials were stopped in March 2019 due to apparent futility by a data safety monito...

The number of new requests for orphan drug designation in the United States increased 41% from 2019 to 2020, bringing the number of requests to 753 for 2020, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.   There was also a significant jump in rare pediatric disease designation requests, which rose 330% from 2019 to 2020, for a total of 284 requests in 2020. The agency received 20 humanitarian use device designation requests, similar to the number received in 2019...

A few ingredients are essential to advancing therapies for rare diseases: organized patients, the involvement of academic researchers, and support and flexibility from the US Food and Drug Administration and industry. That’s according to Frank McCormack, MD, professor of medicine at the University of Cincinnati. “It begins with the courage and resolve of patients. The patients had the foresight to organize, and facilitate and fund research, and then they lined up for tr...

On Monday, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced a series of efforts and a day-long conference centered on addressing the unmet needs of patients with rare diseases. FDA leaders announced the initiatives in recognition of Rare Disease Day, observed on February 28.   A new request for applications (RFA) issued by FDA augments the agency’s Orphan Products Grants Program. The RFA is seeking natural history studies to address unmet needs in rare diseases, l...

Stakeholders weighing in on a proposed rare disease clinical trials network called for regulatory clarity, smart use of existing resources, and a move toward harmonized trial standards and assessments.   As part of the launch of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA)’s Rare Disease Cures Accelerator , the agency asked for stakeholder input on how FDA and other agencies can achieve a more cooperative approach in supporting the drug development pipeline for rare dise...

Officials from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) discussed the agency’s recent efforts to support the development of products to treat rare diseases during a session at DIA’s Global Annual Meeting on Wednesday.   Orphan and rare pediatric disease designations   While the number of products approved to treat rare diseases has increased over the last decade, the vast majority of rare diseases lack approved treatment options.   Janet Maynard, director of F...

A panel of experts at BIO Digital on Wednesday discussed some of the challenges and regulatory considerations for sponsors developing treatments for ultra-rare diseases where clinical trials could involve a very small number of patients.   When asked where companies should begin their development for extremely rare diseases, Brad Glasscock, global vice president and head of global regulatory affairs at BioMarin said, “First and foremost I think is understanding whether...