New ‘miracle’ drug has ‘given me my life back’

An Ohio grandmother taking the first drug proven to slow Alzheimer’s disease said, “I’m totally functional and my memory is much better than it was.”

“I’m very active, I drive regularly, I garden and cook, I read a number of books and I have my life back,” Joan Murtaugh, 77, told the Sun.

“This drug is little short of a miracle, from our perspective,” added her husband Larry, 77.

Joan was among the first people to take the drug, Leqembi (lecanemab), during a clinical trial at the Cleveland Clinic.

But Joan had no idea if she would be taking the drug or a placebo. Nonetheless, she took a chance and enrolled in the clinical trial.

“I knew the Cleveland Clinic is a first-class operation and when they thought they had a drug that might help — and I desperately needed help — I was going for it,” Joan said. “I had no second thoughts.”

Leqembi is the first drug that’s been proven to delay the progression of Alzheimer’s, a debilitating neurological disease that gets worse over time, leading to a decline in memory, lack of mobility and other complications.

Made by pharmaceutical firms Biogen and Eisai, the drug helps slow these symptoms by going after the “underlying disease process,” Teresa Buracchio of the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research said in a statement.

Another groundbreaking Alzheimer’s medication, donanemab, developed by drugmaker Eli Lilly, had a successful clinical trial and is expected to be approved by the FDA this fall.

These new drugs are “just the opening chapter in a new era of … therapies for Alzheimer’s disease,” Dr. Gil Rabinovici, director of the University of California San Francisco’s Memory and Aging Center, wrote in an editorial for JAMA.

Joan’s memory problems started in 2016, and tests confirmed she had mild cognitive impairment, an early phase of memory loss — although 10% to 15% of people with the condition go on to develop dementia.

Along with taking cognitive speech therapy, Joan now injects herself with Leqembi once a week at home, using an auto-injector similar to an EpiPen.

“When Joan was diagnosed my fears were that this would be a downward spiral,” her husband said. “It used to be that when you mentioned Alzheimer’s you were looking into an abyss.

“Now this drug offers a great hope for the future. I’ve seen improvements in Joan’s short-term memory. She’s a fighter,” Larry added.

“Interestingly, the main reason people participate in clinical trials … is they say it may not help me but it may help other people,” said Dr. Babak Tousi of the Cleveland Clinic. “They want to pay it forward.”