Skip ads and navigation
Advertising
Our network sites seattlepi.comHelp
The Life Sciences Blog
Print thisE-mail this
A week in Seattle's life sciences land

It was not a good week to take time off. There was quite a bit of news. Here's a review, which I've arranged roughly in order of importance:

On the medical device front:

  • Physio-Control said it has reached an agreement with the FDA, under which it should eventually be able to start selling its defibrillators again. In January 2007, the Bothell-based unit of Medtronic voluntarily suspended shipments of its defibrillators, citing quality-control issues.

    The agreement appears to signal another delay in getting the defibrillators back on the market. We reported in November that the company was on track to resume full shipments by April 30 (read the story here).

    And on the biotech front:

  • Cell Therapeutics said it would raise roughly $28 million by selling preferred stock and debt to an institutional investor. The new funds were crucial since the company had $10.8 million in debt due in June and was short on cash. In a press release (read it here), Cell Therapeutics said that in addition to retiring the June debt, the company would use the new funds to purchase access to late-stage data of its Zevalin therapy, which it could potentially use to expand the cancer treatment's uses.

  • Genentech said its Rituxan treatment failed to meet the company's goals in a study looking at Rituxan's potential use in patients with lupus. Currently, the treatment is approved for patients with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and rheumatoid arthritis. Kevin DeGeeter, an analyst at Oppenheimer & Co. and a noted bear on ZymoGenetics, wrote in a research report that "we view the data as a significant negative for (ZymoGenetics)." That's because, he argues, ZymoGenetics' Atacicept therapy has a "similar mechanism for B-cell suppression as Rituxan." ZymoGenetics is testing Atacicept in patients with lupus.

    On the topic of Atacicept, ZymoGenetics said Wednesday that partner Merck Serono had initiated a phase two trial of the treatment in patients with relapsing multiple sclerosis. (Read a release here.)

  • MediQuest Therapeutics said it had formally asked the FDA to approve its therapy for Raynaud's Disease, which the company calls MQX-503 (read our story on the announcement here). MQX-503 is a topical formulation which is designed to prevent or treat symptoms, including severe pain, associated with Raynaud's. Raynaud's disease affects mostly women and restricts blood flow to the fingers and toes, causing them to turn white. After the attack dies down, blood rushes back, creating red, tingly digits. More than 2 million people in the U.S. seek treatment each year for the disease, and MediQuest has said that it expects the market for its new drug to be worth more than $700 million.

  • Targeted Genetics said that an early-stage study of a gene therapy in three patients with Leber's congenital amaurosis showed that the therapy improved visual function in one of the patients. Leber's congenital amaurosis is a rare disease that results in total blindness by mid-age. There is no treatment. Targeted Genetics expects to enroll more patients in the study. Read Targeted Genetics' release here.

  • Acucela Inc. reported pre-clinical data, showing that animal models had demonstrated that a compound developed by the company had resulted in an "improvement in retinal abnormalities" in a blinding eye disease called retinopathy of prematurity. The company said the results were promising because in retinopathy of prematurity, blood vessels abnormally spread throughout the retina. The company's compound could potentially be a treatment.

  • A week doesn't go by without some Dendreon development. Washington CEO magazine covered the Dendreon saga in an article in its latest issue. The story doesn't break new ground but provides a thorough review of the controversy around Dendreon's Provenge prostate cancer treatment. Read the story here.

    • Posted by at May 5, 2008 10:39 a.m.
    Categories: , , , , , , , , ,
    Comments
    There are currently no comments for this blog entry.

    ! Login below to post a comment.

    Registered users, log in here
    E-mail 
    Password 
    Remember me
     HELP! I forget my password

    Unregistered users, sign up now

    Or post anonymously (About this feature)

    Your comment (No HTML allowed, use these special codes instead)
    Violating our Terms of Service may result in your post being removed.

    Special codes
    • [b]selected text[/b] -- Display the selected text in bold.
    • [i]selected text[/i] -- Display the selected text in italics.
    • [link]www.seattlepi.com[/link] -- Creates a link to the url between the link tags.
    • [link title="Seattle Post-Intelligencer"]www.seattlepi.com[/link] -- Creates a link to the url between the link tags, uses title as link text.
    • [mail]newmedia@seattlepi.com[/mail] -- Creates a link to an email address.
    Enter the code shown:
    What is this?
    BLOGGER BIO
    photo
    Joe Tartakoff: P-I staff reporter
    CONTACT INFO

    News tips or comments? E-mail me or call directly, 206-448-8293.

    TOP OF THE BLOG

    Most popular posts in May, by page views
    1. Dendreon awaits interim Provenge results
    2. Dendreon talks up a new drug
    3. UW criticized at medical device summit

    THE INFLUENTIAL

    A series on the blog taking stock of Seattle's biotech leaders
    · Who are Seattle's most influential biotech leaders?
    · The CEO: Bruce Carter
    · The entrepreneur: Bruce Montgomery
    · The investor: Alan Frazier
    · Your choices

    THE STATE OF BIOTECH

    A series on the blog
    · Seattle's contracting biotech job market
    · Venture capital numbers here don't measure up
    · A fall in the market value of local firms

    ARCHIVES
    July 2008
    SMTWTFS
        12345
    6789101112
    13141516171819
    20212223242526
    2728293031   
    Browse by month
    Browse by category

    Recent entries
    · Bill stalls, along with Zevalin reimbursement
    · Does investor's bid put Northstar into play?
    · Investor offers to buy Northstar Neuroscience
    · VLST hires top Seattle Genetics executive
    · Transactions in the works at ZymoGenetics?
    · ZymoGenetics inks $100 million financing deal
    · Most influential in biotech: Your choices
    · Most influential in biotech: Alan Frazier

    Search this blog

    RSS/Web feeds (help)
    RSS 2.0RSS 1.0Atom
    Headlines for your site

    LINKS

    Blogs
    · Pharmalot
    · John Cook's Venture Blog
    · blog.bioethics.net
    · Eye on FDA
    · In the Pipeline
    · IN VIVO Blog
    · The Biotech Weblog
    · DrugWonks
    · Biotech Blog
    · BioHealth Investor
    · Xconomy Seattle
    · Andy's Take

    Groups
    · Washington Biotechnology and Biomedical Association
    · Northwest Association for Biomedical Research

    Rumors
    · Biofind

    Jobs
    · WBBA Careers
    · Medzilla
    · BioJobBlog

    Resources
    · Clinicaltrials.gov

    Most recent posts
    · School Zone: More to Dee Dee Rainbow's story
    · Seattle 911: Retrospective: Reasons for the fireworks warnings
    · Seattle 911: Burned by fireworks? Here's what to do

    *Would you like to blog for us?

    ADVERTISING
    AP BUSINESS HEADLINES
    · Oil prices fall more than $1 a barrel
    · EU widens Billiton-Rio Tinto probe
    · 9 convicted in Austria fraud case
    · TPG pulls out of Bradford & Bingley plan
    · Travel experts: US share of foreign tourists slips
    *more
    AP HIGH-TECH HEADLINES
    · Canadian telecom BCE, suitor agree on terms
    · Court orders YouTube to give Viacom video logs
    · Internet addressing agency loses its own addresses
    · Adobe to make searching easier on Flash sites
    · Ex-tech exec gets new judge in extradition case
    *more
    Advertising

    Seattle Post-Intelligencer
    101 Elliott Ave. W.
    Seattle, WA 98119
    (206) 448-8000

    Home Delivery: (206) 464-2121 or (800) 542-0820
    seattlepi.com serves about 1.7 million unique visitors
    and 30 million page views each month.

    Send comments to newmedia@seattlepi.com
    Send investigative tips to iteam@seattlepi.com
    ©1996-2007 Seattle Post-Intelligencer
    Terms of Use/Privacy Policy

    Hearst Newspapers