Specifically, the product showed potential to stimulate key immunologic parameters and to stabilize the loss of CD4+ cells, which could help prolong the time before these patients need to initiate antiretroviral therapy. The data was presented at the13th Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) in Denver.
“CD4+ counts may be an especially important marker of disease progression and we plan to build on this data with our most potent clinical candidate, IR103,” noted Dr Joseph O’Neill, president and CEO of The Immune Response Corporation. “We have two ongoing clinical studies that will investigate IR103 in the drug-naive patient population.”
The analysis included data from 49 patients that completed the study, and showed that median absolute CD4+ cell counts remained stable through week 28 in the patients that received three injections of the HIV-1 immunogen but declined in both the IFA and saline groups.
The HIV-1 immunogen’s effect on immune reconstitution was evidenced by an augmented production of factors known to reduce HIV replication, such as beta chemokines and alpha defensin. These data suggest a possible mode of action via boosting the body’s own defense against HIV, which could play a role in delaying the initiation of antiretroviral therapy.