Chagas disease future or investigational therapies

Editor-In-Chief: C. Michael Gibson, M.S., M.D. [1] Associate Editor(s)-in-Chief: Yazan Daaboul, M.D.

Although novel investigational drugs are being studied for chronic Chagas disease, to date no new pharmacologic therapy has proven to be effective compared with the current standard of care (benznidazole therapy)

• Clinical trials that evaluate the efficacy of novel investigational therapies for chronic Chagas disease are scarce, primarily because it has been difficult for researchers to define efficacy endpoint in clinical trials in the past.^[1]

• The introduction of PCR results for the evaluation of drug success has been useful for the study of novel investigational drugs
• The following investigational drugs have been studied. Although the drugs were associated with high rates of negative PCR successful results immediately post-treatment, long-term follow-up demonstrated that the majority of patients who received those drugs relasped with positive PCR results.^[1]

• Posaconazole – Patients in the posaconazole arm had a significantly higher rate of positive PCR during 12-month follow-up compared with the benznidazole arm.^[1]

• Ravuconazole – Patients in the ravuconazole arm had a significantly higher rate of positive PCR during 12-month follow-up compared with the benznidazole arm.^[1]

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