
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, May 10, 1990                   TAG: 9005100562
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A/3   EDITION: EVENING 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: BOSTON                                LENGTH: Medium

ALTERNATIVE AIDS TREATMENT STUDIED

The experimental drug DDI can help AIDS patients gain weight and feel better but can have severe, even life-threatening side effects, according to two reports published today.

Many hoped the new medicine would be a less toxic alternative to AZT, the only medicine approved for routine use against AIDS. A major nationwide study is under way to see how DDI compares with AZT in controlling the disease.

The new, smaller studies confirm that DDI is promising, but also caution that it can harm the pancreas and cause other painful symptoms.

"There is some evidence that it inhibits the AIDS virus," said Dr. Howard Liebman of Boston City Hospital, senior author of one of the studies. "The important question is: Will the spectrum of toxicity prove to be the limiting factor of the drug? Will that make it not any better than AZT and perhaps worse?"

The two studies, conducted on small numbers of patients by doctors at Boston City and the University of Rochester, were published in the New England Journal of Medicine. The results were similar to those of another preliminary study conducted at the National Cancer Institute and published last July in Science.

All three studies were so-called Phase I trials. They were intended to determine the maximum dose that patients can tolerate, not whether the medicine had an effect on their illness. Nevertheless, the researchers found that many of the patients clearly improved while taking DDI for a few weeks.

In an editorial in the New England Journal, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of AIDS work at the National Institutes of Health, wrote that "there certainly is a suggestion of short-term benefit from DDI."

About 800 patients are enrolled in a major study that compares DDI with AZT, or zidovudine. An additional 8,600 people who cannot take AZT because of side effects or worsening symptoms are using DDI in an unusual program that makes the drug available prior to its formal approval by the Food and Drug Administration.

Even if DDI turns out to be no better than AZT, it may still be an alternative for some patients. AZT often loses its effectiveness after a year or so of treatment, and it also suppresses the body's ability to make new blood cells.

by CNB