Flutemetamol PET Imaging Agent Useful for Detection of Amyloid Plaque Linked to Alzheimer's Disease

New clinical research data suggest that 18F flutemetamol could be valuable when combined with current diagnostic tools used by physicians and provide accurate identification of beta amyloid plaques, considered a sign of neurodegeneration associated with Alzheimer's disease (AD).

Flutemetamol, a GE Healthcare (Chalfont St. Giles, UK) positron emission tomography (PET) imaging agent currently in phase III development, is being studied to identify the uptake of beta amyloid via imaging of the brain tissue in live humans. Currently, beta amyloid is identified from brain samples acquired post-mortem. Together with other GE Healthcare imaging modalities, this may help physicians detect amyloid deposition and assist in the detection and treatment of AD.

"The wealth of data presented this year at the annual HAI meeting fundamentally support the value Flutemetamol could bring to the Alzheimer's community,” said Jonathan Allis, MI PET segment leader, GE Healthcare Medical Diagnostics. "The ability to make visual assessments of amyloid in AD patients may enable physicians to seek earlier, confirmed diagnosis of AD and make more informed care decisions.”

Data highlights from five clinical abstracts from studies of flutemetamol, presented at the 5th annual Human Amyloid Imaging (HAI) meeting in Miami (FL, USA) in January 2011, suggest that (1) the in vivo PET retention of flutemetamol and PIB (Pittsburgh compound B) have comparable patterns of binding; (2) there is a strong concordance between flutemetamol amyloid imaging and cortical biopsy histopathology using both visual and quantitative methods; (3) the combination of flutemetamol and structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) can provide information that could be useful in understanding other (non-AD) neurodegenerative diseases and in identifying beta amyloid formation; and lastly (4) flutemetamol scans can be categorized with automated software suitable for use in clinical practice.

"At GE Healthcare, our scientists and researchers remain fully committed to developing enhanced diagnostics tools that may help Alzheimer's disease patients and their families get accurate information as early as possible,” said Pascale Witz, CEO, GE Healthcare Medical Diagnostics.

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