FDA to Allow Ceftriaxone Study

After more than a year’s delay, during which the Food and Drug Administration received additional data showing the drug was safe to give intravenously to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) patients for several months, a trial of the antibiotic ceftriaxone is slated to begin this summer.

Ceftriaxone, used to treat neurologic infections, may have benefit in ALS by enhancing a chemical recycling process in the nervous system. It will be tested in some 40 centers, according to neurologist Merit Cudkowicz, an MDA research grantee at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.