"The drug recently failed as an adjunctive treatment in a phase 3 trial for inadequately controlled schizophrenia, and, as Goldman Sachs analyst Asad Haider noted, new-to-brand prescription growth appears to be moderating as the second quarter nears its end.
But Bristol Myers CEO Chris Boerner and Chief Commercialization Officer Adam Lenkowsky don’t see things that way.
“We’ve got very good feedback from physicians in terms of what they’re seeing on positive symptoms, negative symptoms and … the cognitive benefits,” Boerner said at the Goldman Sachs Annual Global Healthcare Conference this week."
Cobenfy’s launch is tracking against expectations, having surpassed 30,000 total scripts following an FDA approval in late September, according to Lenkowsky
Lenkowsky acknowledged that it’s going to take time to continue to increase the number of prescribers and to get doctors to break the decades-old habit of using generic dopamine D2 receptor antagonists to treat schizophrenia.
BMS believes Cobenfy will see strong uptake “in the back end of the year,” Lenkowsky said.
But, apparently, not all responses from doctors have been positive. One of Leerink’s experts said he hasn’t observed remarkable efficacy for Cobenfy among patients who haven’t responded to other schizophrenia treatments, the setting in which he has primarily been using the drug because of prior authorization requirements from insurance."
Appears that it failed in an adjunctive treatment trial coupled with atypical antipsychotics. I was under the impression that Cobenfy is most effective as a standalone drug. I guess this solidifies those beliefs.
It passed the monotherapy trial, so there is obviously something to it.
It looks like it was the same issue that made that other one fail the stage 3 trial, too. I forget the med name, but it showed an unusually strong placebo response, and meant the med on its own failed to outperform the placebo by a large enough margin.
I think it is effective for me. I understand things that I didn’t understand on a dopamine D2 receptor agonists. It need Wellbutrin, though, for focus and depression.
My pdoc said she’s gotten good feedback on it.
They might just respond to clozapine if the side effects are ok.
Oh, yeah, that one too! I was thinking of one that never made it to the market, but I forget what it was called. Rouliperidone?
I suspect that there is such a strong mental component to negative symptoms that most short-term studies will have this issue. They would need to test for a longer time to see if the placebo wears off.