Parkinson’s hope
Why this matters: the result is interesting because it points to a potential disease-modifying strategy, not just symptom control. But that distinction is still tentative. A small, early trial can show that a drug deserves closer study; it cannot yet show that the medicine will reliably change long-term outcomes for most people with Parkinsonโs disease.
One important takeaway is the difference between a signal and a recommendation. The study suggests benefit, but it does not settle who should use these medicines, at what dose, or for how long. In conditions as variable as Parkinsonโs, improvements can also be influenced by background treatments, symptom fluctuation, adherence, and the fact that participants in trials are often not representative of everyone living with the disease.
There is also a practical safety layer here. Drugs in the GLP-1 class are already known to cause gastrointestinal side effects, and that matters when considering any off-label use in people who do not otherwise need them for diabetes or weight management. Even if a lower dose eventually proves enough, the real-world balance between possible neurological benefit and tolerability still needs careful testing in larger, longer studies.
For readers, the most useful interpretation is cautious optimism. This is not evidence to self-medicate, but it is a plausible lead that could reshape Parkinsonโs research if confirmed. The next phase needs to answer a narrower question: whether the effect is robust enough, and safe enough, to justify routine use beyond the patients who already have another clear indication for these drugs.
A diabetes drug for Parkinsonโs
The Parkinsonโs disease community got encouraging news last week when a team of French researchers reported that patientsโ motor ability improvedย after a yearโs treatment with an old diabetes medicine called lixisenatide. But when I called them, the research team had a message for patients: donโt take these drugs quite yet — at least not unless you also have diabetes or obesity.
The message is nuanced. It suggests Parkinsonโsย patients with other conditions that make them eligible for drugs like lixisenatide could consider taking them. The medicine is no longer sold in the US but there are newer options in the same class, including Novo Nordiskโs blockbusters Ozempic and Wegovy.
Last weekโsย study followed only 156 patients, not enough people to say for sure how big the benefit โ and potential risks โ of the drug could be. It didnโt follow them for long enough to see whether the impact increases over time. Also unclear is what dose might be most helpful.
โWe wouldnโt like that they take our results too simplistically,โ said Olivier Rascol, one of the studyโs leaders, a Toulouse University Hospital neurologist and chairman of the French Clinical Research Network for Parkinson’s Disease and Movement Disorders. โThis is a proof of concept study and we need more data, more trials, before we can conclude and eventually recommend to treat patients with this strategy.โ
There are crucial differences between Ozempic and the older lixisenatide. For one, Ozempic doesnโt penetrate the brain, according to Wassilios Meissner, who heads the neurodegenerative-disease unit at University Hospital Bordeaux and helped lead the study.
The researchers used the lixisenatide dose recommended for type 2 diabetes, yet when some patients went to a lower amount during the study because of nausea, a common side effect of the drug, there was no evidence it was working less well for their Parkinsonโs disease, Rascol said. โA lower dose might be sufficient to protect the neurons,โ he said.
Funded by Cure Parkinsonโs and the French government, the study was a decade in the making. Now the researchers must convince local drugmaker Sanofiย to make more of the drug for a large clinical trial. The company is open to a discussion about providing support for the next phase of research, a spokesman said in an e-mail. Meanwhile, results from a bigger trial of another old diabetes drug, AstraZenecaโs exenatide, are due out later this year โ results which, if positive, could push more investment in the area, the French team said.
โIt is not yet 100% sure,โ said Rascol of the work with Sanofi. โBut we are hoping that they will help us.โ โNaomi Kresge
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