From various wire sources, including Reuters:
Johnson & Johnson added a new warning to the label of its Alzheimer's treatment, Reminyl. REcently two studies reported deaths of 13 patients who took the drug and one who took a placebo.
According to the company, the deaths "were due to various causes that could be expected in the elderly population" such as heart attacks and strokes, and the findings were "highly discrepant" with other studies of Reminyl, the company said in a letter to physicians.
The two studies involving more than 2,000 patients were testing Reminyl as a treatment for mild cognitive impairment, a less severe condition than Alzheimer's disease. The rate of deaths in patients who got a placebo was lower in the mild cognitive impairment trials than in trials of Alzheimer's disease patients. The information about the deaths, which the company disclosed in January, was added to the "precautions" section of the Reminyl label, a less severe alert than other prescription drug warnings.
I'll have the link to the study once it's out on the web.
