All 14 patients were observed to display clinically meaningful improvements in physical function with 9 doses over a 3 week period which was measured in 4 tests: gait speed; walking speed in 6 minutes; chair rise testing; and a score related to a bank of physical function tests. However patient lung function, frailty levels, clinical test outcomes, and overall health did not change.
Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis was the focus of this study which is a progressive and fatal condition related to senescent cells, using an open label senolytic drug called dasatinib plus quercetin to clear the senescent cells and investigate effectiveness.
James Kirkland, M.D., Ph.D., explains this was a short safety trial to investigate whether they should move ahead with an actual large scale human trial; while measurable improvement was noted in all subjects this is simply the start of human studies and it is not known what lies ahead, and full trials are now ongoing marking important first steps.
