Trial of Theracurmin for Patients With Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS)
Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis
About this trial
This is an interventional treatment trial for Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis
Eligibility Criteria
Inclusion Criteria:
- Male or female, aged at least 18 years.
- Sporadic or familial ALS diagnosed as possible, laboratory-supported probable, probable, or definite as defined by revised El Escorial criteria.
- Patient is able to understand and express informed consent (in the opinion of the site investigator).
- Patient has access to the Internet on a desktop computer, laptop, or tablet and has a working email address.
- Patient or caregiver is willing and able to use a computer and enter data on a secure website.
- Patient is able to read and write English.
- Patient is expected to survive for the duration of the trial.
- Women must not be pregnant (will have evidence of a negative pregnancy test obtained by local physician within past 7 days or be post-menopausal)
- Women must not be able to become pregnant (e.g., post-menopausal, surgically sterile, or using adequate birth control methods) for the duration of the study and three months after study completion. Adequate contraception includes: abstinence, hormonal contraception (oral contraception, implanted contraception, injected contraception or other hormonal contraception, for example patch or contraceptive ring), intrauterine device (IUD) in place for ≥ 3 months, barrier method in conjunction with spermicide, or another adequate method.
Exclusion Criteria:
- Patient is taking other experimental treatments for ALS (those that are part of an active research study).
- Prior side effects from curcumin or turmeric containing products
- Patient has a medical or psychiatric illness that could in the investigator's opinion interfere with the patient's ability to participate in this study.
- Pregnant women or women currently breastfeeding.
- Life expectancy shorter than the duration of the trial.
- Taking an antiplatelet agent or anticoagulant (due to the theoretically increased risk of bleeding from curcumin products).
Sites / Locations
- Duke University Medical Center
Arms of the Study
Arm 1
Arm 2
Experimental
No Intervention
Open Label Arm
Healthy Control Arm
The intervention is twice daily dosage of Theracurmin 90 mg capsules. This same dose was used in a successful trial of patients with mild cognitive impairment. Theracurmin HP capsules containing 90 mg curcumin each that will be taken as one capsule twice daily for 6 months. Each capsule contains 300 mg Theracurmin enhanced bioavailable water-dispersible turmeric rhizome complex providing 30% curcumin (90 mg). The content of Theracurmin HP has been independently certified by NSF International under NSF/ANSI 173.
We will seek to enroll 50 healthy control participants. We will attempt to enroll one control subject from each enrolled primary participant's home, preferably a spouse or partner of similar age if possible. We plan to use this data to compare the microbiome of control participants to that of the ALS participants at baseline, week 4 and month 6. We will not conduct further follow-up or collect additional samples with the control subjects.