New radiopharmaceutical enters testing

Draxis Health of Mississauga, ON, has gotten the nod from Canadian officials to begin clinical trails of a radiopharmaceutical designed to image difficult-to-diagnose infections. The radiopharmaceutical promises to selectively distinguish infection from inflammation by binding directly with bacteria. It combines the widely used antibacterial agent ciprofloxacin with technetium-99m.Enrollment in the study is scheduled to begin in January. The Phase I study, to be conducted at Hôpital Hotel-Dieu, Centre Hospitalier de L'Université de Montréal, will involve 10 healthy subjects. Whole-body images will be taken periodically after injection of the drug to visualize its distribution throughout the body over time.