The General University Hospital of Catalonia (HUGC), through the Clinical Research Unit (UDIC), has included the world’s first patient in a phase I clinical trial on Alzheimer’s.

This study could improve the efficacy and safety of the products being evaluated to try to modify the progressive course of mild to moderate prodromal Alzheimer’s disease.

In this research, which is identified with the name Brain shuttle, a solution to the difficulty of access of drugs inside the central nervous system is proposed. It is a technology developed by Roche to increase the penetration of large molecules, such as antibodies, into the brain.

Specifically, the safety and tolerance at different doses of an antiamyloid monoclonal antibody (gantenerumab) are evaluated with a module that acts as a shuttle to cross the blood-brain barrier and release it into the brain.

This is key, as one of the main obstacles in the development of new treatments is their ability to cross the blood-brain barrier and reach the brain (due to its large size), unlike the drugs used in these therapies to date.