A survey of clinical trials with fenbufen.

To date, the efficacy and safety of gamma-oxo(1,1'-biphenyl)-4-butanoic acid (fenbufen) have been evaluated in over 200 clinical trials involving several thousand patients. The program of clinical investigation consisted of open dose ranging studies in patients; short-term, double-blind controlled studies of both cross-over and parallel group design to evaluate efficacy and safety compared to placebo and active reference drugs; long-term, double-blind controlled studies of parallel group design versus an active reference agent; open studies to evaluate the long-term efficacy and safety of fenbufen; and special studies to investigate possible effects on eyes, ears and heart. The overall experience with fenbufen in 60 US and 37 foreign clinical trials is summarized in this report with respect to the following: therapeutic efficacy and safety in rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, analgesia and gout. The age range covered in these studies was 13 to 87 years, and included 206 patients over the age of 70. 3457 patients received fenbufen in all phases of these clinical trials, including short-term and long-term studies. The patient total includes: 1462 patients (664 US, 798 foreign) with rheumatoid arthritis, 1225 (420 US, 805 foreign) with osteoarthritis, 55 (19 US, 36 foreign) with ankylosing spondylitis, 39 (foreign) with gout, and 676 patients (103 US, 573 (foreign) who participated in analgesia studies. The worldwide clinical studies have demonstrated very good clinical efficacy of fenbufen in comparison to other non-steroidal antirheumatic (nsa) drugs. The tolerance was much better in many cases compared with tolerance levels of other nsa-drugs. The good results were confirmed by new papers presented during IX International Congress of Rheumatology, Wiesbaden/FR Germany, September 1979. Fenbufen is currently marketed in Brazil, Columbia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Great Britain, Greece, Guatemala, Honduras, Ireland, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Philippines, Rhodesia, Spain, South Africa, Switzerland, Trinidad and FR Germany.