Finding effective treatments for progressive supranuclear palsy has been one of the biggest challenges in brain disease research.
A fresh analysis by scientists at Tel Aviv University now suggests that one experimental drug may have been overlooked because researchers originally analysed men and women together instead of separately. The study appeared in Molecular Psychiatry.
Progressive supranuclear palsy is an uncommon disease that slowly destroys brain cells.
People gradually lose balance, develop stiffness, struggle to move their eyes, and find speaking, swallowing, and daily activities increasingly difficult. The disease is linked to the build-up of an abnormal form of tau protein, and there is currently no medicine that can reliably slow its progression.
The medicine being studied is Davunetide, which was previously tested in a year-long international clinical trial involving more than 300 patients. At the time, researchers concluded that the drug was safe but did not work well enough to be considered an effective treatment. Rather than accepting that conclusion, the Tel Aviv team revisited the information using modern methods now recommended by the FDA.
The new analysis produced an unexpected discovery. Women treated with Davunetide experienced slower worsening of their disease, while men showed little or no measurable improvement. This suggests that the medicine may benefit a specific group of patients rather than everyone with PSP.
The improvements seen in women extended beyond simple movement tests. They were better able to maintain balance, perform everyday tasks independently, and preserve important thinking skills such as language and working memory. These benefits could have a meaningful impact on quality of life if confirmed in future research.
The scientists also uncovered major biological differences between women and men. The way abnormal tau protein levels matched disease severity was almost the opposite between the two sexes. This finding raises the possibility that the disease itself behaves differently in women, helping explain why one treatment may work for one group but not another.
Professor Illana Gozes said these results show why future research should routinely consider sex differences when studying neurological diseases. Understanding these differences could improve the design of clinical trials and reduce the chance of overlooking useful medicines.
The findings may also have wider importance because tau protein plays a major role in several other diseases, including Alzheimer’s disease. Lessons learned from PSP could therefore influence future treatment development across a much larger group of patients.
The researchers recommend new clinical trials specifically designed to evaluate Davunetide in women with PSP. Only carefully planned studies can determine whether the benefits seen in this reanalysis can be repeated under controlled conditions.
If you care about brain health, please read studies that eating apples and tea could keep dementia at bay, and Olive oil: a daily dose for better brain health.
For more health information, please see recent studies what you eat together may affect your dementia risk, and time-restricted eating: a simple way to fight aging and cancer.
Source: Tel Aviv University.
