SUMMARY
UCLA researchers in the department of Dentistry have developed a novel method to alleviate complications of medications used to treat osteoporosis.
BACKGROUND
Osteoporosis is a bone disease that results in bone fragility and increased risk of fractures. The prevalence of this disease rises steadily with advancing age, and due to the longer life expectancy of individuals in the United States, the population of individuals with osteoporosis is projected to rise. Surprisingly, mortality associated with osteoporosis is almost 30%, a rate similar to breast cancer. It is therefore unsurprising that a range of drugs have been developed to treat the disease, one such notable class being anti-resorptive. However, a major pitfall of these therapies are off the target effects that in rare cases can contribute to new disease phenotypes. For instance, anti-resorptive medications can contribute to the onset of medication related osteonecrosis of the jaw (MRONJ). This known off target effect causes a significant population of patients with osteoporosis to not be eligible for this effective treatment. Therefore, the invention of a treatment that could circumvent this known off target effect could possibly help a large portion of the population with the debilitating disease of osteoporosis.
INNOVATION
Dr. Tetradis at UCLA has developed a novel method for the treatment of drug induced osteonecrosis. The invention is based on the generation of osteoclast formation. Through this upregulation the resorption of drugs that treat osteoporosis is significantly inhibited. This method of treating the off target effects of anti-resorptive medications is novel, and the method represents a first in class method for its mitigation. Therefore, the presented invention stands to benefit a significant portion of the population in the near future.
POTENTIAL APPLICATIONS
• Treatment of osteoporosis in patients with extreme side effects to MRONJ
ADVANTAGES
• The first in class treatment of off target effects to anti-resorptive medications
• Minimally invasive due to shallow injections
DEVELOPMENT-TO-DATE
The invention has been tested in-vivo in mice, and tissues that had been previously effected with anti-resorptive medications now have dense stratification of osteoclast formation as visualized by histopathological analyses.
Related Papers (from the inventors only)
There has not been any public disclosure of the invention