Aducanumab for Alzheimer’s: Putting PRIME in Perspective (Video)

When interim results from the PRIME study of aducanumab for Alzheimer’s disease were recently published in Nature, buzz about the study in the consumer media was instant — and sometimes hyperbolic.

Despite the encouraging findings that this monoclonal antibody reduced amyloid-beta plaques in a dose-dependent fashion, it’s important to remind excited patients and families of the study’s relatively preliminary nature. Despite its inclusion of 165 patients and its randomized, placebo-controlled design, the PRIME study was still a phase 1b trial.

Confirmation of its findings is being sought in ongoing phase 3 trials, and Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health is a participating center. In this video, one of the Cleveland Clinic neurologists involved in phase 3 testing of aducanumab — James Leverenz, MD — shares perspectives on the PRIME findings, what they mean for the amyloid hypothesis, and the road ahead for aducanumab.