UCLH begins clinical trial of Alzheimer’s drug developed at UCL

A clinical trial of a new drug candidate for Alzheimer's disease which has been developed at UCL in partnership with the pharmaceutical company Eisai has begun at UCLH with participants now being screened. Participants in the trial, conducted at the UCLH Leonard Wolfson Experimental Neurology Centre (NIHR UCLH Clinical Research Facility), will have the rare inherited form of Alzheimer's disease. The drug being looked at - known as E2814 - will target tau protein found in the brain, known to be responsible for disease progression. It is the first time a treatment targeting tau is being trialled in people with the inherited form of Alzheimer's disease. The trial is being carried out by the Dominantly Inherited Alzheimer Network Trials Unit (DIAN-TU), an international collaboration sponsored by Washington University School of Medicine to test new experimental therapies for Alzheimer's. E2814 is the first drug to be tested for their DIAN-TU tau study. DIAN-TU's Chief Investigator in the UK is Dr Cath Mummery, consultant neurologist at the NHNN and head of clinical trials at the UCL Dementia Research Centre in the UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology.