LCT and jdrf
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Posted by Andra on 23:11:36 2010/07/25
Message from the CEO
I am pleased to report steady progress with our clinical program. The New Zealand trial has advanced successfully to complete its second phase, with all eight insulin dependent patients having received DIABECELL® implants. Four of these patients have received higher doses and shown no remarkable adverse events as a result of treatment. It is also very satisfying to see indications of benefit early in this trial as DIABECELL® has previously not been given to diabetes patients, such as the volunteers in New Zealand, who have difficult to treat unstable diabetes.
This milestone for the New Zealand trial has been very enthusiastically received by the medical and financial communities. The Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International after due diligence assessment of LCT's diabetes program and clinical protocol has provided a generous financial grant to support the New Zealand trial. This most recent display of confidence from a key international sponsor of diabetes research, in addition to the recent support for our clinical development program from the New Zealand Government, demonstrate the widespread strong interest in our work.
While it is still too early to report the full outcomes from this trial, we can reveal that the first four patients with unstable diabetes treated with DIABECELL® have all shown the benefit of reduction or elimination of episodes of low blood glucose levels that are often life-threatening. I look forward to sharing with you interim results that we expect to be reported in greater detail by October, and I am confident that the data will continue to support the further development and commercialisation of DIABECELL® for Type 1 diabetes.
LCT again joined other leading New Zealand biotech companies at the annual Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) international convention held in Chicago, USA in early May. BIO is the world's largest biotechnology conference, hosting over 15,000 industry leaders from 49 US states and 65 countries. We had a successful week generating international interest and increasing LCT's presence on the world stage. During the week, I had about 40 meetings with potential collaborators as well as several media interviews, and LCT was selected to present a showcase presentation.
I recently returned from an investor road show with Susanne Clay in Australia where I met a number of current and prospective investors in LCT to update them on our progress. Their continued interest and support is very encouraging as we plan the next stages of our DIABECELL® clinical trial program.
Our other programs are also producing considerable interest around world. In April a research paper written by LCT was selected as one of the best publications for 2009 by the prestigious Journal of Neural Engineering. This paper discusses the latest research we are conducting with our other living cell therapeutic product NTCELL and its promising potential for long term treatments of central nervous system diseases, including Parkinson's disease, Huntington's disease, stroke and hearing loss.
Paul LJ Tan
Dr Paul LJ Tan
CEO
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