Today was a much anticipated date in the search for the first medical treatment for NASH. Madrigal Pharmaceuticals, a Pennsylvania-based Bio-Pharma company, has been running clinical trials with its NASH candidate MGL-3196, and was due to announce the preliminary results of those trials.
And the results blew away all expectations according to Bloomberg, leading to a 140% gain in the companies stock.
Patients getting Madrigal’s experimental therapy known as MGL-3196 had a two-point reduction in a score that measures disease activity with a liver biopsy. More patients getting the drug saw improvement compared to those getting a placebo, and half of the patients whose disease was resolved also had their fibrosis disappear.
Another analysis at Seeking Alpha laid out the key points:
39% of the responders at week 12 experienced complete resolution of NASH at week 36 compared to 6% for placebo (p=0.001). Fibrosis was resolved in half the patients.(emphasis mine)
Mean liver fat reduction was 37.0% in the treatment group compared to 8.9% for placebo.
No new safety signals were observed.
So 39% of the patients had their NASH symptoms completely resolved by week 36 of the treatment, which is incredible! Of those that had demonstrable fibrosis, half of all patients were “cured”.
These are still clinical trials and much more research will be needed but this is a very positive day for the NASH community.
Read the full press release from Madrigal.
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