Today, the companies developing and testing safinamide, Newron Pharmaceuticals and Merck Serono, informed the waiting world that the drug had not met its goals in clinical trials, or end points. End points are measures that are set at the beginning of the trial to determine if a drug or treatment is indeed effective.
Still, hope is not lost. Researchers know these objectives are lofty. They see in the statistics that the medication appears helpful, just not as helpful as they had hoped, and is indicated by setting such aggressive endpoints. They also noticed that the study patients receiving lower doses of safinamide actually had more positive results. So they are planning to perform more clinical trials with lower doses to see how well it helps people with Parkinson's disease.
Source: Newron Pharmaceuticals S.p.A, Reuters