#MSParis2017 – TG Therapeutics to Discuss Ublituximab’s Effectiveness at ECTRIMS–ACTRIMS Meeting in Paris

TG Therapeutics will discuss ublituximab’s ability to deplete B-cells linked to multiple sclerosis and to reduce inflammatory brain lesions at the 7th Joint ECTRIMS–ACTRIMS Meeting in Paris next month.

The three presentations will cover preliminary results of a Phase 2 clinical trial (NCT02738775) of ublituximab’s safety and effectiveness as a treatment for relapsing forms of MS, the company said in a press release.

ECTRIMS stands for the European Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis, and ACTRIMS for American Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis. The conference will be Oct. 25-28.

Dr. Amy E. Lovett-Racke of Ohio State University will discuss ublituximab’s ability to decrease B-cells associated with MS after six months of treatment.

Ublituximab is an antibody that targets B-cells carrying the CD20 protein on their cell surfaces. These cells are thought to play a role in MS development.

Dr. Matilde Inglese of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York will discuss ublituximab’s ability to decrease study participants’ inflammatory brain lesions.

And Dr. Edward Fox of Central Texas Neurology Consultants, the trial’s principal investigator, will do a poster-session presentation on the study’s patient characteristics and preliminary results as a whole, including safety.

The ongoing Phase 2 trial is still recruiting patients with relapsing forms of MS. Researchers are randomly assigning participants to receive intravenous infusions of either ublituximab or a placebo.

One of the study’s primary goals is to see how well ublituximab depletes B-cells 28 days after the start of treatment. Another primary goal is to see how safe the therapy is, with the measurement being treatment-related adverse events that patients experience over six months.

Ublituximab’s ability to reduce relapses will be a secondary measure of the trial. Researchers will assess it  after 48 weeks of treatment.

Fox, who is the director of the Multiple Sclerosis Clinic of Central Texas, and a clinical assistant professor at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Round Rock, made a ublituximab presentation at the 3rd Congress of the European Academy of Neurology in June. It revealed that the therapy nearly depleted B-cells only four weeks after treatment started.

Earlier data suggests that ublituximab can be administered in only one hour. Ocrevus, the only approved MS therapy that targets B-cells with CD20, requires 3 1/2 hours.

Although the Phase 2 trial is continuing, the data generated so far supports plans for two Phase 3 trials, TG Therapeutics said. They will randomize patients to receive either ublituximab or Aubagio (teriflunomide).

The trials, which the company hopes to start by the end of September, will be conducted under a Special Protocol Assessment agreement with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. It allows the FDA to evaluate the design and population size of a trial a company intends to use to seek a drug’s regulatory approval.

The FDA has refused to approve therapies whose trial design it believed to be flawed. Obtaining a design sign-off before a trial improves the chance of a treatment being approved if it meets the study’s objectives.