So close, yet so far: Zo­genix LGS tri­al suc­ceeds, but re­sults un­der­whelm

Mere­ly cross­ing the fin­ish line isn’t enough — the win must be de­ci­sive. Ask Zo­genix, whose ex­per­i­men­tal seizure drug met the main goal in a piv­otal study in pa­tients with Lennox-Gas­taut Syn­drome (LGS) on Thurs­day, but saw its shares plum­met af­ter the mag­ni­tude of the ther­a­py’s ef­fect fell short.

The drug, fen­flu­ramine (to be brand­ed Fin­tepla) — one-half of the no­to­ri­ous axed pre­scrip­tion weight-loss cock­tail fen-phen — was test­ed against a place­bo in 263 pa­tients with the rare, treat­ment-re­sis­tant form of child­hood epilep­sy. The da­ta comes months af­ter Zo­genix’s re­vamped ap­pli­ca­tion was ac­cept­ed for re­view in pa­tients with Dravet syn­drome, an­oth­er rare seizure dis­or­der.

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