Fed: Acrux to announce results of hormonal spray study soon

AAP General News (Australia)
04-11-2006
Fed: Acrux to announce results of hormonal spray study soon

By Janelle Miles, National Medical Correspondent

BRISBANE, April 11 AAP - Melbourne-based biomedical company Acrux expects to release
results from a US trial of its spray-on menopause product before the end of the financial
year.

Acrux chief executive Igor Gonda said that if the trial involving 500 women proved
successful, the company would apply for registration of the hormonal spray with the US
Food and Drug Administration.

"We expect the product to be available in the US by next year," Dr Gonda said from
Chicago, where he is attending BIO 2006, the world's largest biotechnology gathering.

But that will depend on the outcome of a large-scale trial of Evamist, which delivers
estradial, a component of oestrogen, to women via a spray to the skin.

Half the women in the study have been randomly assigned to use Evamist once a day,
while the rest are administering a placebo.

Dr Gonda said Acrux, which listed on the Australian Stock Exchange in 2004, also hoped
to market Evamist in Australia, but only after registration of the product in the US.

He said trials were also underway for two other women's hormone sprays being developed
by the company - a contraceptive, and a treatment for sexual dysfunction.

Acrux is one of more than 50 Australian companies represented at BIO 2006.

AAP jhm/rj/tnf

KEYWORD: ACRUX

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