Therapeutic agent for disc herniation

Abstract

The present invention provides a therapeutic agent for disc herniation, which has extremely few adverse side effects, can achieve a prolonged pain-ameliorating effect when administered in only a single dose, and can exhibit a high therapeutic effect and high safety in clinical applications. The present invention relates to a therapeutic agent for disc herniation, which is characterized by containing chondroitinase ABC as an active ingredient and being administered in such a manner that the ingredient can be administered into a human disk in an amount of 1-8 units per disk.

Description

TECHNICAL FIELD[0001]The present invention relates to a therapeutic agent for disc herniation containing chondroitinase ABC as an active ingredient.BACKGROUND ART[0002]Disc herniation is a disease that causes leg pain, low back pain, and the like due to the pressure on nerves of spinal cords, and the like, attributed to protrusion of the disc tissue into the vertebral canal because the nucleus pulposus perforates the anulus fibrosus present therearound. It has been reported that the therapeutic principle is a conservative therapy and approximately 90% of cases have been cured by such a conservative therapy. As the conservative therapy, there have been performed various treatments, such as rest, bed rest, medication (non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), corticosteroids, muscle relaxants), spinal orthosis (corset), traction therapy, thermotherapy, epidural block, nerve root block, and exercise therapy. If no amelioration is seen in these conservative therapies, a surgical t...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0037]In accordance with the present invention, there can be provided a therapeutic agent for disc herniation, which has fewer adverse side effects, is able to complete the therapy of disc herniation in only a single dose, is safe, has a high therapeutic effect and a high clinical usefulness, and is highly practical.

[0038]The present invention is intended to clarify for the first time the existence of a dose that is safe and has a high therapeutic effect as well as a clinical usefulness in chemonucleolysis with chondroitinase ABC and also clarify for the first time the limited range of the dose including 1-8 units, preferably 1-5 units, contributing much to a practical use of chemonucleolysis by the administration of chondroitinase ABC.

Problems solved by technology

However, since the disc also has originally a role as a cushion to support the weight applied to the spine, the cushion function that the disc should have originally had is impaired if the nucleus pulposus is removed in excess.

Therefore, if the nucleus pulposus undergoes nucleolysis excessively even in chemonucleolysis by administration of chondroitinase ABC, the cushion function of the disc that should have originally had is impaired to result in leading to a possibility of adverse side effects.

Completion of the therapy in a single dose administration means that it is required to show a significant therapeutic effect in only a single dose administration and derive the optimal dose with few adverse side effects because multiple dose administration cannot be performed until a complete recovery.

The special nature of a single dose administration and the difficulty in applying animal models to humans as described above make chemonucleolysis with chondroitinase ABC difficult, and, in fact, practical use of chondroitinase ABC has not yet been realized even today though 25 years have passed since 1985 described above.

However, its effective dose has not yet been determined because the effect is not sufficient and the investigation on the adverse side effects has not been made.

However, a detailed study of adverse side effects after administration of chondroitinase ABC has not been carried out.

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