ePillz.com - Qnexa Passes Phase 2 Trial as the Obesity Treatment

Qnexa Passes Phase 2 Trial as the Obesity Treatment

May 10, 2006 - Vivus Inc. –

Vivus Inc. announced a successful completion of Phase 2 Clinical Trials with Qnexa, a novel investigational medication to treat obesity. According to the company's official press-release, more than 50% of the obese people, who participated in the trial, achieved 10 % and more total body weight loss. Qnexa works in two directions, suppressing the appetite and lowering the threshold for satiety, thus affecting two major mechanisms, responsible for the development of obesity.

Qnexa is a novel therapy, developed by Vivus Inc. as the possible alternative treatment of overweight and obese patients. For the time being, Qnexa is in the trial stage, which is necessary prior to application for approval from medical authorities, such as American Food and Drug Administration.

The new drug is, in fact, a combination of two main active compounds, phentermine and topiramate. Both of these chemicals are approved for separate use nowadays.

Phenteramine is rather an old medication, which received FDA approval and became available in the USA in 1959 as an appetite suppressant. Nowadays it is said to be the most commonly prescribed medication to treat people with an excessive body mass. Phentermine covers about 50% of all appetite suppressant prescriptions in the USA and it is sold under the brand names Ionamin and Adipex-P as well as in generic form.

The other active component of Qnexa is topiramate, which is approved as migraine prevention medication and is sold under the brand name of Topamax. Topiramate is also used as an anticonvulsant to treat people with seizures.

Obviously, the developers of Qnexa added topiramate into their investigational drug, trying to enforce the effectiveness of phenteramine. It is known that phentermine, when used alone, may lose its effectiveness over time. That is the major reason for the appearance of the so-called “cocktails” - mixtures that contain phentermine and one of the popular anti-depressants. For example, Phen-Pro stands for the cocktail, containing phetermine and Prozac. Though, it is worthy to mention, that the use of such cocktails is considered to be "off-label" and is not approved by Food and Drug Administration.

In case of positive results from all the necessary trials of Qnexa, this pill may become the first legal "cocktail" to treat obesity. In the meantime, the results from Phase 2 Trial showed that the rate of weight loss in patients, treated with Qnexa, did not slow down by the end of 24-week treating period.

Vivus Inc. is a pharmaceutical company, which aims to develop and start marketing the new drugs to treat such health disorders, as erectile dysfunction and obesity. For the time being, most of the company’s products are on different stages of clinical studies to check their efficiency and safety.

Nick

External resources
http://ir.vivus.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=79161&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=854671&highli...
http://www.phentermine.com/phentermine_history.htm
http://www.topamax.com/about_topamax/index.jsp