Update on MND-SMART clinical trial

We are incredibly proud to have worked with the MND-SMART team and wider MND community to create lasting motor neuron disease (MND) clinical trial infrastructure for the UK’s biggest ever MND clinical drug trial.   

MND-SMART is pioneering in its approach and design for neurological conditions, including MND, allowing multiple drug treatments to be tested rapidly and efficiently at the same time. The trial is designed to run continuously for years with 20 sites already open across the UK to make sure as many people can take part as possible.   

The trial has announced the latest results. Please visit the MND-SMART website to read their statement and watch a summary video.     

Independent committees have looked at the latest data at an interim analysis and decided that there is no benefit from the first two drugs in the trial and that enough evidence has been gathered to stop testing them.   

While it is undoubtedly disappointing that the data shows the first two drugs in the trial, memantine and trazodone, have no benefit for people with MND, it is a positive outcome that the trial has provided a definitive outcome for both drugs quickly.   

The infrastructure of MND-SMART means that ending testing on these drugs now provides the opportunity to introduce new potential treatments to the trial. The trial started testing a third drug, amantadine, in April 2023 and will be introducing several new drugs in 2024 and 2025.   

The trial is based at the Euan MacDonald Centre for MND Research at the University of Edinburgh and is open to people living with MND across the UK. MND-SMART strives to ensure equitable access to a clinical trial for people with MND and since it launched in 2020 has recruited nearly 600 people.   

We would like to thank everyone who has participated in the MND-SMART trial so far; taking part in clinical trials is vital to help us find effective treatments and a cure.