[S-25] New drug development and the change of treatment strategy in MG

[S-25-2] New Drug Development for Myasthenia Gravis

Henry J. Kaminski (George Washington University, USA)

We are now experiencing the drastic changes in treatment strategy against MG. The Japanese clinical guidelines recommended lower dose of chronic steroids and early fast-acting treatment strategy. Recently, clinical trial of eculizumab was performed and the drug has been approved. Even after the proposal for these new strategies, nearly half of the MG patients do not achieve minimal manifestations status with prednisolone ≤5mg/day (a treatment target in Japan). Substantial number of patients are still administered insufficiently reduced oral steroids which hamper patients’ quality of life. Therefore, treatment status of MG is still far from our satisfaction. Fortunately, several new drugs are under development presently. In this symposium, we will discuss over the new drug development and adaptation status in real world clinical setting in United States, Europe and Asia.

Henry J. Kaminski, MD serves as the Meta A. Neumann Professor and Chair of the Department of Neurology at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences. Dr. Kaminski’s research focuses on therapeutic development for myasthenia gravis, in particular complement mechanisms in mediating the neuromuscular junction injury. His investigations led to the targeting approach to enhance complement inhibition to the neuromuscular junction as a treatment for patients with myasthenia gravis and is moving the invention forward as CEO of ARC Biotechnology. He is a member of the Myasthenia Gravis Foundation of America Task Forces, which established standards for performance of clinical trials in myasthenia gravis that have now been internationally accepted. Dr. Kaminski and his close colleague led an international consortium to develop standards for preclinical research for myasthenia gravis. He is a regular member of the NSD-K study section which evaluates clinical trial applications for the NIH. Dr. Kaminski has served as a consultant in early stage drug development in myasthenia gravis for Alnylam, Akari Therapeutics, UCB, RA Pharmaceuticals, GT Biopharma, Kiniksa, and BioCatalyst.