Novel Drug Reduces Depression Scores within Hours in Phase IIa Trial

Naurex Inc., a clinical stage company developing innovative treatments to address unmet needs in psychiatry and neurology, today reported positive results from a Phase IIa clinical trial of its lead antidepressant compound, GLYX-13. GLYX-13 is a novel partial agonist of the NMDA receptor. The Phase Ila results are being presented at the 51st Annual Meeting of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ACNP), being held December 2-6, 2012 in Hollywood, Florida. The Phase IIa results show that a single administration of GLYX-13 produced statistically significant reductions in depression scores in subjects who had failed treatment with one or more antidepressant agents. The reductions were evident within 24 hours and persisted for an average of seven days. Importantly, the effect size, a measure of the magnitude of the drug's antidepressant efficacy, observed at 24 hours and at seven days after a single administration of GLYX-13, was nearly double the effect size seen with most other antidepressant drugs after 4-6 weeks of repeated dosing. In the Phase IIa trial, GLYX-13 was well tolerated. Reported side effects were mild to moderate and were consistent with those observed in subjects receiving placebo. Consistent with previous studies, GLYX-13 did not produce any of the schizophrenia-like psychotomimetic effects associated with other drugs that modulate the NMDA receptor. "These data are an important step in validating Naurex's mission of developing breakthrough therapies for depression and other CNS disorders," said Derek Small, CEO of Naurex. "Our founder discovered a new class of drugs that appeared to have the remarkable antidepressant efficacy of ketamine-like compounds, but without their limiting side effects.