Piboserod

Background

Piboserod is a selective 5-HT₄ antagonist which was under development by GlaxoSmithKline for atrial fibrillation and irritable bowel syndrome. In 2005 BMI entered into a licensing agreement with GSK for the development of piboserod for the heart failure indication. In 2008 Serodus acquired these rights from BMI.

More information about piboserod, see Wikipedia .

Piboserod in Chronic Heart Failure

In 2007 the first clinical phase II study of piboserod in heart failure patients was completed. The primary objective of this study was to evaluate whether treatment with piboserod compared to placebo improved left ventricular ejection fraction and was safe when administered in addition to other standard therapies in patients with stable heart failure. The study was carried out at 17 centers in Norway, Denmark and the UK, and enrolled 137 patients.

At 24 weeks, as compared with placebo, piboserod caused a small, but significant 1,7 % benefit over placebo in change in LVEF. For the small subset of patients not receiving beta-blocker therapy, there was a trend for a slightly larger benefit with piboserod (2,7 %; P=0,15) (Heart Failure 2008, Milan ).

The clinical phase II study was facilitated by a grant from Innovation Norway.