Glatiramer acetate has no impact on disease progression in ALS at [amount hidden]: a double- blind, randomized, multicentre, placebo-controlled trial

What Was Tested

This randomized controlled trial paper looks at Glatiramer Acetate.

The researchers conducted a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled, multicentre trial.

The primary intention-to-treat analysis was the comparison between the two treated groups of the rates of deterioration on the ALSFRSR scale.

Who Took Part

The abstract describes 159 patients taking part.

PubMed indexes the participants as teenagers, young adults, adults, middle-aged adults and older adults, both men and women.

How the Study Was Run

In design terms this was a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled and multicenter study.

Because people in this Glatiramer Acetate study were split into groups at random, differences between the groups are less likely to reflect who happened to join each one.

Blinding on both sides kept the patients and researchers unaware of who received Glatiramer Acetate.

A placebo (an inactive look-alike) gave the Glatiramer Acetate group a baseline to be compared against.

Running at several centres spread the Glatiramer Acetate study over different clinics and patient groups.

Safety and tolerability of GA were evaluated.

What Was Measured

The primary intention-to-treat analysis was the comparison between the two treated groups of the rates of deterioration on the ALSFRSR scale.

Topics PubMed links to this paper include Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, Disease Progression, Glatiramer Acetate, Immunosuppressive Agents, Outcome Assessment, Health Care and Peptides.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study of Glatiramer Acetate in 159 patients.

The publication is from 2009 (Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis : official publication of the World Federation of Neurology Research Group on Motor Neuron Diseases), a journal based in England.

More context: the Glatiramer Acetate compound page, all human trials.