Duchenne UK is pleased to be supporting the upcoming TREAT-NMD Advisory Committee for Therapeutics (TACT) meeting which takes place on Saturday 29^th May.

TACT is a unique multi-disciplinary international group of well recognized academic and industry drug development experts as well as representatives of patient foundations and institutional governmental scientific research centers.

TACT meets twice a year to review and provide guidance on the translation and development path of therapeutics programs in rare neuromuscular diseases with large unmet need. The confidential and comprehensive review provides recommendations including go-no-go milestones, is independent of any funding stream however it may enable subsequent funding.

Duchenne UK is co-funding Cathy Turner, the DMD programme and TACT coordinator based at Treat-NMD in Newcastle.

The role of the Treat-NMD and TACT coordinator is to work with Professors Bushby and Straub, and the TACT secretariat, based at the John Walton Muscular Dystrophy Research Centre in Newcastle, to develop our clinical trial agenda and support the excellent work of Treat NMD and their TACT meetings to review potential Duchenne Clincial trials and advance and progress the research agenda. 

We are co-funding this post with Joining Jack and the Duchenne Research Fund for five years. We believe this long term funding is crucial to recruiting and maintaining the most committed, experienced and dedicated staff.

Here is a blog written by Cathy Turner about TACT and the upcoming meeting:

This weekend, members of the TACT review committee will be meeting together in the beautiful Scottish city of Edinburgh. The assembled panel will discuss applications for advice on drug development programmes from three applicants, all working in Duchenne muscular dystrophy.

I am travelling up by train on Friday with Professor Volker Straub to meet with the Core Committee – they will be discussing the running of TACT. It’s nice to have such a short journey for us here in Newcastle (last time we flew to Miami!) but for most of our colleagues, there will be much longer times spent in transit – experts are also coming from Manchester and London in the UK, Germany, Italy, Belgium, France, the USA, Canada and Australia. We also look forward to welcoming for the first time Dimitrios Athanasiou from MDA Hellas in Greece as one of our expert patient reviewers.

On Saturday two applications will be discussed with a third on Sunday. The applicants themselves (from the University of Minnesota, the University of Basel and from Servier) will also attend and have an opportunity to answer questions and talk with the experts who have been assigned to reviewing their applications.

The face-to-face meeting in Edinburgh comes after weeks of the expert panels reviewing the detailed written applications and accompanying data. The reviews themselves are overseen by lead reviewers who will also provide a detailed written report back to the applicants in the weeks after the meeting. The whole process is supported by TREAT-NMD and the Secretariat here at Newcastle to make sure that confidential processes are followed, appropriate reviewers have been selected, applicants have provided information needed and, importantly, that everyone has a place to stay in Edinburgh!

More information about TACT can be found on our website and I will be writing a meeting report later in May which will be available to all along with brief details about each application.