GTC Biotherapeutics (fka GTCB)

[mouton29]

I have to say I am reluctant to start thinking about this investment, since my best results to date have been in situations where I have gone with my gut. Here, I purchased mainly because I like goats, Dew seems so convincing, and my family and I had an amusing encounter with two goats on vacation this summer. Further in that vein, station surfing XM radio on my 10 minute drive home from the train station tonight, I listened for 2 minutes to Reach MD, and heard a short piece on thrombosis, in which a Yale profession mentioned the role of antithrombin in pregnancy. Nevertheless....

"I just scanned the article. This section from the discussion explains some of the limitations inherent in this study, including a short duration of ATIII treatment and analysis of treatment effects, unscreened population with regard to ATIII levels etc. All in all, it isn't really anything relevant to rATIII usages in the sepsis trials."

But in the Leo sepsis study (http://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT00506519?term=ATryn&rank=4), unlike the completed but unannounced Atryn study where patients are screened for hereiditary antithrombin deficiency, I see no requirement of screening for ATIII levels. Further, as to the short duration, the protocol in the published study is 4 days of infusion and the Leo study is 5 days -- is one extra day likely to be that important?

Also, on the severe v. moderate sepsis point that Dew raised, I see that the Leo study does specify predicted mortality of 30 - 60%, but it also characterizes this as a study of "severe" sepsis. And in the published study, the survival is 11/16 and 12/17 in the two arms, 31 and 35%, which is at the low end of the predicted mortality in the Leo study.