BURLINGAME, Calif., Sept. 2, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — Cortene Inc. announces publication of its InTiME clinical trial in which a short subcutaneous infusion of its experimental drug, CT38, achieved sustained symptom improvement in ME/CFS. The company intends to test CT38 in Long Covid, the post-acute stage of COVID-19 infection, which is considered by many to be the latest trigger for ME/CFS.
Cortene believes the CRFR2 pathway is upregulated and therefore overactive, leading to the wide variety of symptoms in ME/CFS. “The conventional approach would be to block the overactive pathway,” said Sanjay Chanda, PhD, Cortene’s Chief Development Officer. “Instead, our counterintuitive approach seeks to overstimulate CRFR2, causing it to downregulate, without the need for chronic treatment.”
CT38 was subcutaneously infused at one of four infusion rates for a maximum of 10.5 hours, in 14 ME/CFS patients. CT38 treatment was safe and generally well-tolerated. It was associated with significant reduction in mean 28-day, total daily symptom score (TDSS), which aggregated 13 patient-reported, daily symptom scores. At an infusion rate of 0.03 μg/kg/h, mean TDSS improved by 26% (p < 0.01, n = 7).
“Infusing CT38 is known to cause temporary cardiovascular changes and InTiME revealed that patients were significantly more sensitive to these changes than healthy subjects from a previous safety study,” said Hunter Gillies, MD, InTiME’s medical monitor. “These data support there being a pathological hypersensitivity in the CRFR2 pathway. Given that InTiME showed i) dose-dependent improvements in TDSS; and ii) additional infusions provide additional benefit, the next trial should test CT38 using longer or additional infusions. While infusion rates are somewhat limited by tolerability, it is total exposure at low rates that appears to drive symptom improvement.”
“The persistent improvement in symptoms over weeks using a limited exposure is encouraging. Many patients are still showing signs of improvement almost 2 years after treatment,” said Lucinda Bateman, MD, founder and Medical Director of the Bateman Horne Center, scientific advisor to Cortene, and the Principal Investigator of the InTiME study. “In fact, a few patients expressed a desire for ‘just a little bit more drug’.”
Full details of the trial have been peer reviewed and published in Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience, Acute corticotropin-releasing factor receptor type 2 agonism results in sustained symptom improvement in myalgic encephalomyelitis / chronic fatigue syndrome. The publication explains how the CRFR2 pathway controls homeostasis (maintaining biological system stability), how this pathway can become disrupted at the neuronal level leading to the individual symptoms of ME/CFS and how these same symptoms manifest in many other chronic diseases. Cortene plans to conduct additional trials in patients with ME/CFS and other diseases with similar symptoms using well-tolerated infusion rates and greater total exposure.
To view the full publication, please visit https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnsys.2021.698240/full.
About ME/CFS
ME/CFS is an unexplained, life-long disease, usually triggered by infection, physical/mental trauma, or chemical exposure. Symptoms include diminished physical capacity, pain, sleep issues, cognitive impairment, orthostatic intolerance, among many others, which worsen with innocuous stimulation (referred to as post-exertional malaise) and are not improved by sleep. ME/CFS afflicts 3 million Americans. There are no approved therapeutics and quality of life is worse than in most chronic diseases.
About InTiME
InTiME was a proof-of-concept, single-site, open-label interventional trial, with patients blind as to dose, to investigate the safety and efficacy of CT38 in ME/CFS patients. Efficacy was assessed by a variety of endpoints, including patient-reported daily symptoms scores for each of 13 symptoms, general health (via SF-36), and continuous Fitbit™ monitoring. The primary endpoint was the change in the mean total daily symptom score over the 28-day periods immediately prior to the first treatment (pre-treatment) and immediately prior to exit from the trial (post-treatment).
About CT38
A proprietary peptide agonist, selective/specific for Corticotropin-Releasing Factor Receptor Type 2 (CRFR2).
About Cortene
Cortene Inc. (http://corteneinc.com, @CorteneInc) is a biopharmaceutical startup headquartered in Burlingame, CA, developing therapeutics for treating disorders related to disrupted homeostasis.
Contact: Michael Corbett, CBO, 408-373-7300, mcorbett@corteneinc.com, @CorteneInc on twitter.