Biohaven Follows Allergan in Announcing Positive Results for Rimegepant – an Oral CGRP Receptor Antagonist for the Acute Treatment of Migraine

Last month Allergan reported that their oral CGRP receptor antagonist, ubrogepant was safe and effective in the acute treatment of migraine attacks (see my post). Today, results of a phase 3 trial of a similar drug, rimegepant were reported. Biohaven is the company developing rimegepant, which it licensed from Bristol-Myers Squibb. Rimegepant was shown to be about as effective as ubrogepant with very few side effects, confirming that one of more of these “gepants” will make it to the market. These drugs are expected to be approved some time in 2020.

One piece of information that was not initially released by Allergan is that 5 patients on ubrogepant developed liver function abnormalities on blood tests, compared to only 1 on placebo. None of the patients taking rimogepant had liver function abnormalities. This could spell trouble for the Allergan drug, as it did for the original Merck drug, telcagepant.

Both Allergan and Biohaven have additional oral CGRP antagonists in development for the preventive treatment of migraines.