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Migraine mAbs crowd into late-stage trials

Nature Biotechnology volume 33, pages 676–677 (2015)Cite this article

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A Correction to this article was published on 08 November 2016

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The rival companies (Table 1) will be squaring up for a slice of a market estimated at $3.3 billion market, possibly large enough to encompass all players. About 10% of people worldwide experience periodic migraines and 1.7–4% of the global adult population suffers from disabling migraines 15 or more days a month, according to the World Health Organization. If any of the mAbs sails through phase 3, it would become the first therapy developed specifically to treat or prevent migraine in 50 years, says Lawrence Newman, president of the American Headache Society. “Patients are eager for alternatives.”

Table 1 Selected companies pursuing anti-CGRP mAbs for migraine
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Migraine is characterized by attacks of intense head pain that typically last from 4–72 hours—some suffer from frequent attacks lasting 15 days or longer. Standard care includes drugs repurposed for migraine, such as, anti-seizure medications, drugs from the triptan class of selective serotonin receptor agonists and Botox injections; triptans constrict blood vessels causing side effects that limit their use. Moreover, data suggest that up to 80% of patients who start on a drug prophylactically discontinue it within a year, says Rob Lenz, lead developer of the drug at Amgen, “and about half of them discontinue it within the first month.” The reasons are varied but include fear of side effects.

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Change history

  • 13 September 2016

    In the version of this article initially published, Rob Lenz's quote should have said that about half of patients who discontinue using a prophylactic drug for migraines do so within the first month, rather than within the first week. The error has been corrected in the HTML and PDF versions of the article.

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    Gunjan Sinha

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Sinha, G. Migraine mAbs crowd into late-stage trials. Nat Biotechnol 33, 676–677 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt0715-676c

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