Mary Chapman,  features writer—

People known as “consumer advocates” have joined top scientists since 2011 in helping to determine how funds appropriated by the U.S. Congress will be spent on Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) research. Recently, Tiffany Cook and Clint M. Porter got their turn at patient representation. Cook and Porter’s influence derived…

Longtime Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA) supporter CN Brown Company, a CITGO Petroleum Corporation (CITGO) marketer, raised more than $300,000 for the MDA’s Maine chapter in 2019. “Our family’s commitment to helping win the fight for families affected by MDA has remained strong for generations,” Jeff Jones, CN…

Kevin Schaefer hadn’t been in an airport since he was 4 years old, so he had been looking forward to flying from his home in Cary, North Carolina, to Anaheim, California, in June for the 2019 Cure SMA Conference. As it turned out, his experience didn’t go as expected.

Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy (PPMD) will use PerkinElmer‘s recently federally authorized test to aid newborn screening for Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) in a newly launched pilot program in New York state. Results from the two-year Newborn Screening Pilot for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, launched in collaboration with consortia…

AMO Pharma has begun enrollment for a Phase 2/3 trial that will assess the experimental oral therapy AMO-02 (tideglusib) in children and adolescents with congenital myotonic dystrophy type 1 (DM1). The randomized, double-blind trial (NCT03692312) is intended to support regulatory approval of AMO-02 for congenital…

Two University at Buffalo (UB) medical school students were so moved by a classroom video presentation by a young man with Duchenne muscular dystrophy that they are working to raise money in his honor and memory. Second-year students at UB’s Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences,…

Avidity Biosciences has obtained $100 million to advance its programs for muscle disorder therapies, including a potential Antibody Oligonucleotide Conjugates (AOC) treatment for myotonic dystrophy type 1 (MD1). Based on a technology pioneered by Avidity, AOCs belong to a new class of lab-made molecules that combine the selectivity…

Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy (PPMD) announced it is updating its global registry with a new, user-friendly app intended to empower people with Duchenne muscular dystrophy and their families to become more informed and engaged. Created by Thread, a company that specializes in remote and decentralized patient…

To address the need in precision medicine for human biological specimens, CureDuchenne is creating a biobank to provide Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) researchers with a collection of blood and skin tissue samples. The overarching goal is to use the biorepository to fuel and advance DMD research. The CureDuchenne Biobank…

Dyne Therapeutics announced that it has joined in supporting an ongoing global and observational natural history study to better inform the development of treatments for facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD). The company’s support — the amount was not disclosed — will help to bring new sites across Europe into…