PrecisionMed ACE Registry Press Release
April 3, 2006
PrecisionMed Inc. and CDR Announce ``The
Aging Cognition Evaluation Registry'' (The ACE Registry):
A
Prospective Serial Biological Sample Collection With Simultaneous
Longitudinal Cognition Testing in Subjects 60 Years and Older.
PrecisionMed Inc. and
Cognitive Drug Research (CDR) today announced at the 58th annual
meeting of the American Academy of Neurology in San Diego, enrollment
of the first subject into The ACE (Aging Cognition Evaluation)
Registry. The ACE Registry is a PrecisionMed-CDR collaboration to
develop a biological sample bank of DNA, RNA, CSF, serum, plasma and
urine associated with serial cognition testing utilizing
PrecisionMed's clinical sample and data procurement and storage
capabilities, and a cognition battery selected from CDR's proprietary
gold-standard computerized testing platform.
The ACE Registry will be a collection of correlated data and
biological samples for the investigation of the early markers of
cognitive decline. About 15% of normal subjects 60 years and older are
expected to develop cognition impairment over a one-year period.
The ACE Registry will enroll up to 5,000 cognitively normal
individuals aged 60 years and above. Subjects will be recruited and
sampled in the United States and cognition will be evaluated at up to
10 draw/cognition testing sites. Design and maintenance of the
cognition battery interface as well as data analysis and report
generation will be managed by CDR. Enrollment has just begun and is
expected to take about five years to complete. Key aspects of
subjects' cognition including memory and attention will be evaluated
every six months with simultaneous biological sample banking for a
period of at least 10 years. Samples will be available immediately on
a monthly basis as subjects are enrolled and progress through the
protocol.
"PrecisionMed is dedicated to establishing cohorts of premorbid
individuals for in depth longitudinal clinical and biological
evaluation," said John Flax, M.D., President and CEO of PrecisionMed.
"In The ACE Registry we will establish robust baseline cognition
scores using the same validated instruments every six months, and thus
any ongoing change will be accurately and repeatedly quantified. In
neuropsychiatric disease specifically, accurate phenotyping is
critical in relating changes in the clinical picture to alterations in
biology. PrecisionMed's collaboration utilizing CDR's proprietary
cognition platform is an example of the potential for both companies
to contribute directly to the understanding of the biology of memory
disorder. PrecisionMed has prior experience with cognition evaluations
in banking projects involving Alzheimer's disease, schizophrenia and
elderly control populations and maintains a collection of samples from
these populations which includes CSF."
Dr. Keith Wesnes, CEO of CDR, summed up his delight with the
collaboration, stating: "We are very pleased to maintain our position
at the forefront of work in dementia. Combining our expertise in
assessing human cognitive function with PrecisionMed's expertise in
the collection and storage of vital samples will provide a great
resource for improved understanding of the cause of conditions that
can devastate families worldwide."
Six monthly samples with matched clinical data will be available
on a longitudinal basis to our clients. Custom requests for additional
sample types, as well as more complex clinical, laboratory and/or
radiographic evaluations within selected subpopulations will be
entertained as the registry matures.
PrecisionMed Inc.
PrecisionMed Inc., founded in 1994, is a privately held human
biobank in the San Diego, California, area. Its sample bank is a
repository of human blood, DNA, RNA, PBMC, serum, plasma, urine and
CSF linked to de-identified audited clinical data. Samples are
available to the pharmaceutical industry to enhance drug discovery and
development, therapeutic target validation and molecular diagnostic
product development. PrecisionMed provides customers access to samples
with associated clinical information from a population of
disease-specific subjects and healthy matched controls. PrecisionMed
is rapidly expanding its collections to include additional
neuropsychiatric and other diseases. PrecisionMed offers custom sample
collections in any disease area.
Cognitive Drug Research Ltd
CDR Ltd was established in 1986 specifically to meet the
ever-increasing need of the pharmaceutical industry to identify the
actions of novel compounds upon the elements of human cognition that
underlie activities of daily living. CDR provides the gold-standard
computerized assessment system that can be used to detect alterations
in the efficiency of cognitive functioning simply and quickly, in
almost any environmental setting. The organization has investigated
the effects of a wide variety of compounds in many indications. They
have conducted over 500 clinical trials at more than 1000 research
sites worldwide.
This release may contain forward-looking statements. Various
factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those
projected in forward-looking statements. Although the Company believes
that the forward-looking statements contained herein are reasonable,
it can give no assurance that the Company's expectations are correct.
All forward-looking statements are expressly qualified in their
entirety by this cautionary statement.
CONTACT:
PrecisionMed Inc., San Diego
John S. Flax, M.D., 858-847-0117
or
CDR Ltd, Goring
Mark Ware, +44 (0) 1491 878723
www.cdr.org.uk
SOURCE: PrecisionMed Inc.
About the ACE Registry
ACE Longitudinal Cognition Followup
ACE Registry Recruitment Update
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