FDA Grants Orphan Drug Designation to Octapharma USA’s Experimental Dermatomyositis Drug Octagam

Octapharma USA’s investigational drug IVIG (brand name Octagam) to treat dermatomyositis, has received FDA orphan drug designation.
Octapharma USA’s investigational drug IVIG (brand name Octagam) to treat dermatomyositis, has received FDA orphan drug designation.
In MDA, Destiny found the support and community she needed to live fully as a 12-year-old, as a college student and now as a mom to two kids. That’s why she’s been a passionate Muscle Walk fundraiser for the past 15 years, whether she was well enough to walk in the event or not. That’s why she’ll continue participating.
For more than 60 years, firefighters have teamed with MDA to fight back against muscular dystrophy, ALS and related life-threatening diseases.
For one firefighter, the cause became very personal when his son, Chandler Mallen, was diagnosed with juvenile dermatomyositis, a neuromuscular disease that involves inflammation of the muscles. When Chandler asked his father — Scott, a firefighter who has collected donations for MDA’s Fill the Boot program for almost 25 years — if he’d lose the use of his legs, he didn’t wait for an answer.
“Even if I do,” Chandler said, “I’ll never stop trying.”
Investigators are seeking people to participate in a phase 2 clinical trial, sponsored by Idera Pharmaceuticals, to evaluate the effect of the experimental drug IMO-8400 on skin lesions and muscle weakness in dermatomyositis. While the cause of dermatomyositis is unclear in most cases, it is known that ongoing inflammation triggered by the disease, over time, . . .