Das erste Schizophrenie-Medikament seit Jahrzehnten mit einem neuen Wirkmechanismus hat heute die behördliche Zulassung in den USA erhalten. In klinischen Studien linderte KarXT die Kernsymptome der Schizophrenie, zeigte Anzeichen einer Verbesserung der kognitiven Funktion und vermied Nebenwirkungen, die häufig mit älteren Antipsychotika verbunden sind.

I’ve linked to the news release in the post above. In this comment, for those interested, here are the links to the peer reviewed journal articles:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0920996424003724

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(23)02190-6/abstract

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2818047

From the linked article:

Revolutionary drug for schizophrenia wins US approval

The medication is the first in decades to have a different mode of action than do current drugs, achieving better symptom relief with fewer side effects.

The first schizophrenia medication in decades with a new mechanism of action won US regulatory approval today. The approval offers the hope of an antipsychotic that would be more effective and better tolerated than current therapies.

The drug, known as KarXT, targets proteins in the brain known as muscarinic receptors, which relay neurotransmitter signals between neurons and other cells. Activating these receptors dampens the release of the chemical dopamine, a nervous-system messenger that is central to the hallmark symptoms of schizophrenia, such as hallucinations and delusions.

But muscarinic signalling also modulates other brain circuits involved in cognition and emotional processing. This mode of action provides KarXT with a more comprehensive therapeutic effect than other schizophrenia treatments, which mainly blunt dopamine activity alone.

In clinical trials, KarXT not only alleviated core symptoms of schizophrenia, but also showed signs of improving cognitive function, all while avoiding many of the burdensome side effects commonly associated with older antipsychotics.

“This will be a revolution of the treatment of psychosis, and I’m not saying this lightly,” says Christoph Correll, a psychiatrist at the Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell in Hempstead, New York, who helped to analyse data from the trials. “Now we will now be able to treat people who haven’t been helped with traditional antipsychotics. That’s highly exciting.”

wikipedia
> Xanomeline regulates key **dopaminergic** and **glutamatergic** circuits in the brain that are thought to be imbalanced in patients suffering from neuropsychiatric and neurological diseases

I wonder if this also would help against ADHD and the cormorbidty of proneness to addiction and impulse eating?