MediciNov's MN-166 Reduces Odds Of Heavy Drinking by 45% After 14 Days Of Treatment

MediciNov Inc MNOV has announced that positive results from a Phase 2 trial of MN-166 (ibudilast) in alcohol use disorder (AUD) were published in Nature's Translational Psychiatry.
The trial was funded by the Center for Study of Opioid Receptors and Drugs of Abuse.
The trial evaluated the effect of 14 days of ibudilast treatment on mood, heavy drinking, and neural reward signals in individuals with AUD. A total of 52 AUD patients were enrolled in this trial.
Key results reported in the publication include the following:
- Ibudilast did not have a significant effect on negative mood.
- Ibudilast, relative to placebo, reduced the odds of heavy drinking across time by 45%.
- Ibudilast attenuated alcohol cue-elicited activation in the ventral striatum (VS) compared to placebo.
- Alcohol cue-elicited activation in the VS predicted subsequent drinking in the ibudilast group (p=0.02), such that individuals who had attenuated ventral striatal activation and took ibudilast had the fewest number of drinks per drinking day in the week following the scan.
- Ibudilast reduced alcohol craving compared to placebo on non-drinking days.
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