Monday, September 18, 2017

Possible Cures for Type-1 in the News (September)


Catching Up With NNC0114­-0006 (Anti IL-21)

Back in 2015 Novo-Norsk started a clinical trial into a combo treatment of NNC0114-0006 and Liraglutide (which is more commonly known as Victoza).  I ignored this trial, because I thought that NNC0114-0006 was a new form of insulin, and they were testing a treatment for type-1 diabetes. However, I have since found out that NNC0114-0006 targets IL-21 and that Liraglutide may stimulate beta cell growth.  Therefore, this combination could have the effect of stopping the autoimmune attack while at the same time regrowing beta cells, and that would be a path to a cure.

Liraglutide is approved for use in type-2 diabetes and works by increasing insulin production. Recently, experiments in mice have suggested that it works (at least partly) by helping the body grow more beta cells, and preventing the death of beta cells:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4418765/

NNC0114-0006 is an anti IL-21 treatment.  IL-21 is a chemical that the immune system uses for communication, and several experiments have suggested that too much IL-21 is important to creating type-1 diabetes:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18779574
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19208913
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00125-015-3509-8
(and there are many more such studies.)

So combining these two treatments provides a possible path to a cure.

The Current Study

The study that started in 2015 is a phase-II? trial (the question mark means that it is a phase-II trial, but there has never been a phase-I trial for this combination of treatments).  The basic study design is four groups: one group gets both treatments, one group gets two placebos, one group gets NNC0114-0006 and placebo, and one group gets Liraglutide and a placebo.  So they have all their bases covered. The study is large: 304 people recruited from 100+ sites all over the US and Europe.

The clinical trial record says that this study is recruiting patients.  However, when I look at the list of locations, every one is marked "Active, not recruiting", "Completed", or "Suspended", so I'm very hopeful that they have recruited all the patients that they need.  That is important, because they expect to collect data for 80 weeks.  Their target completion date is April 2019.

This is actually the fifth study of NNC0114­-0006.  You can see the list here:
https://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/results?cond=&term=NNC0114%C2%AD-0006
The four previous studies were smaller (between 10 and 65 people), and were done on other autoimmune diseases: Rheumatoid Arthritis, Crohn's Disease, and Systemic Lupus Erythematosus.

Clinical Trial Registry: https://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT02443155
Other Study ID Numbers: NN9828-4150
2014-001215-39 ( EudraCT Number )
U1111-1154-7172 ( Other Identifier: WHO )
REec-2015-1768 ( Registry Identifier: Spanish registry )

Metreleptin Fails A Phase-I Trial

Back in the 2008-2010 timeframe there was some hope that Leptin would cure type-1 diabetes, and a clinical trial was started in 2010.  Then in 2015 the trial was canceled by one of the sponsors.  Finally, now in 2017 the results have been published, and the conclusions are:
Metreleptin is safe but may not be efficacious in improving glycemic control in patients with T1DM, although it reduces body weight and daily insulin dose modestly.
You can read my previous blogging here:
http://cureresearch4type1diabetes.blogspot.com/search/label/Leptin
The abstract is here: http://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/40/5/694?etoc
Clinical Trial Record: http://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01268644

Interesting Treatment for Multiple Sclerosis

I usually do not blog on cures or treatments for other diseases.  However, MS, type-1 diabetes and several other diseases are all from the same family of "autoimmune diseases".  They are all caused by the body's immune system attacking a different organ or internal system.  So in theory, research into curing one of these diseases might help cure the others.

So with that in mind, I thought this study was interesting:
Multiple Sclerosis Therapy NKTR-358 Begins Phase 1 Clinical Trial:

Basically, this company has a treatment which causes a person to generate more Treg cells.  Since Treg cells regulate the immune system, having more of them might prevent the immune system from attacking the wrong cells.  In type-1 diabetes, we have several research programs aimed at increasing Treg counts, but usually by growing more Tregs outside the body, and then infusing them into the body (T-Rex, Stem Cell Educator, and Stem Cells of Arabia are all working on similar ideas). NKTR-358 is a treatment which (they hope) will cause the body to generate more Treg cells, itself.

Also, NKTR-358 works at least partially, by targeting the IL-2 receptor in the immune system, and this receptor is also an active target of research in type-1:
http://cureresearch4type1diabetes.blogspot.com/2016/05/general-update-on-il-2-research.html
(and the IL-2 targeted by NKTR-358 is different than the IL-21 targeted by NNC0114-0006 above.)

Company Information: http://www.nektar.com/pipeline/rd-pipeline/nktr-358
Some animal data: http://www.nektar.com/application/files/6514/9970/7031/Langowski_NKTR-358_WCI2017.pdf

Joshua Levy
http://cureresearch4type1diabetes.blogspot.com 
publicjoshualevy at gmail dot com 
All the views expressed here are those of Joshua Levy, and nothing here is official JDRF or JDCA news, views, policies or opinions. My daughter has type-1 diabetes and participates in clinical trials, which might be discussed here. My blog contains a more complete non-conflict of interest statement. Thanks to everyone who helps with the blog.

Monday, September 4, 2017

ViaCyte Clinical Trial News: VC-01 is Fully Enrolled, VC-02 Starts

This blog posting covers two important pieces of news from ViaCyte.

ViaCyte's Phase-II Trial of VC-01 is Not Recruiting
(But What does that mean?)


I missed this news, when it was announced back in May 2017, but ViaCyte's Phase-II clinical trial of VC-01 is not recruiting more people.  I'm not sure if this is a "pause" between their phase-I group and their phase-II group, or if they have finished recruiting all people for both groups.  That's important because they are gathering effectiveness data for six months.  So whatever group they finished recruiting in May, they should have effectiveness data in November.  Effectiveness data for 15 people would be good, but from the full 65 people would be even better.  Since this trial is not blinded (and has no control group), they could publish their data as soon as they have it, if they want to.

Also, they are gathering safety data for two years, so that same group will finish gathering safety data in May 2019.  The same "15 people is good 65 people is better" and "with no control group, they can publish if they wish" applies to this safety data as well.

Clinical Trial Registery: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT02239354

Differences Between ViaCyte's VC-01 and VC-02 Treatments

ViaCyte has started a clinical trial for their VC-02 stem cell implantation product, but as this treatment is not a cure (by my definition of "cure"), I will not be following it.  Don't mix up VC-02 with their earlier VC-01 product.  VC-01 is a potential cure, and I will follow it moving forward.

I found this confusing: why would a company test a non-cure after they had a cure already in the pipeline, and ahead of the non-cure?  Why even bother with the non-cure?

While VC-01 and VC-02 are encapsulated stem cells, the nature of the encapsulation is completely different.  VC-01 uses a "strong" encapsulation which prevents the body's immune system from attacking the new cells. This prevents both the normal rejection (ie. the foreign organ reaction), and type-1 rejection (ie. the malfunctioning autoantibody reaction) from attacking the new cells.  Therefore, VC-01 does not require anti-rejection drugs.  VC-02 uses a "weak" encapsulation which holds the stem cells together and in one place, and encourages new blood vessels to integrate into the encapsulation, but provides no immune protection.  People getting VC-02 will need to take anti-rejection drugs [d1].

Both VC-01 and VC-02 have the same cells inside.  They both start with ViaCyte's PEC-01 cells. These are created by harvesting human embryonic stem cells from a long-existing culture and treating them so they differentiate into pancreatic cells.  The cells that are inside the devices are these pancreatic cells.   (There are no "raw" stem cells in the device.)  This process is described on ViaCyte's web site here:
http://viacyte.com/technology/stem-cell-engineering/

The obvious question is, why would any person with type-1 diabetes choose to be in the VC-02 trial, if they could be in the VC-01 trial?  The immunosuppression required by VC-02 has known bad side effects, and there are known risks in taking those drugs for decades.

First is that the VC-01 trial is not recruiting right now.  So if you want an encapsulated ViaCyte stem cell treatment right now, VC-02 is your only option.  I don't know if the VC-01 trial is completely enrolled, or if it will open up again, to gather a second group of patients.

Second is this: The ViaCyte team believes that the reason some implanted beta cells work and some fail is "vascularization".  Vascularization is the body's ability to grow blood vessels into the new beta cells so that they can get oxygen, remove waste products, and generally integrate with the host person.   ViaCyte believes that the encapsulation used in VC-01 will allow this vascularization and therefore be successful.   However, they also believe that VC-02 will have even better vascularization, and therefore an even higher chance of success.  So if someone currently has type-1 diabetes, they may choose to have VC-02 because it has a higher chance of success (even if this is a trade off against a known higher risk from the treatment).

The VC-02 Study

Although there is only one official clinical trial of VC-02, there are two patient groups within this trial (which they call "cohorts"), and these cohorts are really separate phase-I and phase-II trials. It's just that one clinical trial registry covers both. The first cohort will be 15 patients, all of whom will get a low dose version of the treatment. The second cohort will be 40 patients, all of whom will get a higher dose version of the treatment. There is no control group. They expect to finish the second cohort in Dec 2020.

They are collecting their primary safety data at 4 months post transplant, and primary effectiveness data (C-peptide data) at 6 months post transplant.

They are recruiting at two sites:

  • University of California San Diego, San Diego, California, United States, 92121
    Contact: Study Coordinator    1-844-317-STEM (7836)    alphastemcellclinic@ucsd.edu
  • University of Minnesota Recruiting, Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States, 55455
    Contact: Study Coordinator    612-626-4993    kreel001@umn.edu

Clinical Trial Registry: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03163511
ViaCyte's FAQs: http://viacyte.com/clinical/faqs/

Joshua Levy 
http://cureresearch4type1diabetes.blogspot.com 
publicjoshualevy at gmail dot com
All the views expressed here are those of Joshua Levy, and nothing here is official JDRF or JDCA news, views, policies or opinions. My daughter has type-1 diabetes and participates in clinical trials, which might be discussed here. My blog contains a more complete non-conflict of interest statement. Thanks to everyone who helps with the blog.