SAN MATEO, Calif., Jan. 22, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Medeor Therapeutics, Inc., a clinical-stage biotechnology company dedicated to the discovery, development and commercialization of personalized cellular immunotherapies, today announced that the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) has approved an award to the company for $18.8 million under its Clinical Trial Funding Initiative. The award is to support a Phase 3 clinical trial to evaluate the safety and efficacy of MDR-101, the company's development-stage donor-specific cell therapy program for HLA-matched living donor kidney transplant patients.
"We are very grateful for the financial support and validation from CIRM for the MDR-101 program," said Steven R. Deitcher, M.D., Chief Executive Officer of Medeor and Principal Investigator for this CIRM-supported clinical trial. "For the over 3,000 Californians who receive an organ transplant every year, the risk of rejection is ever-present, despite the required immunosuppressive drug cocktail. The goal of our program is to allow HLA-matched living donor kidney transplant patients to reduce the risk of kidney rejection and loss, while allowing these patients to stop taking all immunosuppressive drugs. If this program is successful, we can avoid the enormous cost of re-transplant and ongoing kidney dialysis for those whose new kidney fails. We would also dramatically improve the quality of life for these patients."
This CIRM award is part of the Agency's Clinical Trial Funding Initiative, which is designed to accelerate the support of promising stem cell treatments through any stage of clinical trial activity. The funding awards were made at the January 18, 2018 meeting of the Stem Cell Agency's governing Board, the Independent Citizens Oversight Committee (ICOC).
About Medeor Therapeutics, Inc.
Medeor Therapeutics is a clinical-stage biotechnology company dedicated to the discovery, development and commercialization of personalized cellular immunotherapies to improve outcomes in organ transplant recipients. Medeor's series of product candidates each comprise a unique composition of different types of hematopoietic organ donor-derived cells, based on breakthrough technologies discovered at Stanford University and exclusively licensed by Medeor. These product candidates are designed to produce mixed chimerism, the co-existence of both recipient and donor blood and immune cells in the recipient, to achieve donor-specific immune tolerance, to prevent transplant organ loss, to reduce or eliminate chronic immunosuppressive drug therapy, and thereby to improve patient outcomes. For more information, visit www.medeortherapeutics.com.
About CIRM
At CIRM, we never forget that we were created by the people of California to accelerate stem cell treatments to patients with unmet medical needs, and act with a sense of urgency to succeed in that mission. To meet this challenge, our team of highly trained and experienced professionals actively partners with both academia and industry in a hands-on, entrepreneurial environment to fast track the development of today's most promising stem cell technologies. With $3 billion in funding and approximately 300 active stem cell programs in our portfolio, CIRM is the world's largest institution dedicated to helping people by bringing the future of cellular medicine closer to reality. For more information, go to www.cirm.ca.gov.
Contact
Matthew Plunkett, Ph.D.
Chief Financial and Business Officer
mplunkett@medeortherapeutics.com
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SOURCE Medeor Therapeutics, Inc.
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