Bedinvetmab (Librela) for chronic pain: various potential canine indications
Having started our own dog on Librela recently I’m pretty impressed that she seems to cope better with her dodgy joints. We still seem to be a bit short on objective data: a pubmed search turns up no actual evidence. However, It’s interesting and potentially widely-applicable that bedinvetmab may also be effective in a lot of other pain scenarios.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6326241/
And, as monoclonal antibody, it seems likely to be relatively safe alone and in combination with other analgesic medications.
As medics we are especially interested in potential indications in:
-cancer pain
-chronic pancreatitis
-other visceral pain
To quote Enomoto et al.
‘Rodent models suggest significant therapeutic potential in cancer pain in humans, and the same is likely true of companion animals. To our knowledge, no efficacy studies with anti-NGF mAb have been performed. However, a study showed that the majority of canine osteosarcoma primary tumours and pulmonary metastases expressed TrkA protein, and its signalling protected against apoptosis since blockade of NGF/TrkA signalling induced apoptosis of canine osteosarcoma cell lines. Thus, anti-NGF mAb may provide significant relief of bone cancer pain90 and slow the progression rate of tumour growth‘
‘The main symptom of patients with pancreatitis is severe abdominal pain. NGF was found to be upregulated and notably expressed in the pancreas in both human patients with chronic pancreatitis and a rat model of acute and chronic pancreatitis. Furthermore, in the study of patients with chronic pancreatitis, the expression levels of NGF and TrkA mRNA in pancreas were strongly related with pain intensity and frequency. Although, to the best of our knowledge, no clinical study has been conducted, several studies in acute or chronic pancreatitis models in rats showed robust reduction of pain following an administration of blockade of NGF/TrkA signalling. Anti-NGF therapy may be useful for the pain management of acute or chronic pancreatitis in companion animals.’
Thanks Roger !!
We have started a few arthritis patients on it but good to know about pancreatitis and cancer
H x
Thanks Roger, I see the cat one advertised now also. Solensia, where do they get the names., I thought Solensia was a Polish ski resort !
Well what about bedinvetmab?! I’m sure that’s in Armenia
My 11 year old Rottweiler suffers a lot from abdominal pain, explicitly after feedings.
The cause remains unknown und the only food he gets by now is cooked chicken. As regular food seems to
worsen the pain and causes more digestive issues.
Unfortunately, the Librela injection (only 1) did not help in any way with the level of pain he is in.
We are really hoping that the 2nd dose may do the job.
But if not, I am afraid it really is only helpful related to bone and joint issues.
At the SAMSoc Autumn meeting this year, I have asked Matt Gurney to talk about chronic pain in medicine cases and to bring in information on these new products. https://www.samsoc.org/meetings/2021-autumn-meeting It should be interesting!