Lund­beck­'s Dun­sire has some­thing to cheer as Rex­ul­ti com­bo shows promise in PTSD

With gener­ics eat­ing in­to sales of three key drugs and a re­cent key set­back in schiz­o­phre­nia, new Lund­beck CEO Deb­o­rah Dun­sire can fi­nal­ly en­joy a bit of good news: the Dan­ish com­pa­ny’s block­buster an­tipsy­chot­ic br­ex­pipra­zole has yield­ed suc­cess in a mid-stage study in pa­tients with PTSD when giv­en in com­bi­na­tion with the an­ti­de­pres­sant ser­tra­line (Zoloft).

Ini­ti­at­ed in 2017, the 12-week place­bo-con­trolled phase II tri­al en­rolled 321 pa­tients and was de­signed to as­sess br­ex­pipra­zole as monother­a­py, ser­tra­line as monother­a­py or the two as a com­bi­na­tion ther­a­py in adults with PTSD. Br­ex­pipra­zole, which is al­ready ap­proved for use in ma­jor de­pres­sion and schiz­o­phre­nia, is sold as Rex­ul­ti and was dis­cov­ered by Japan’s Ot­su­ka.

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