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Completed

NCT Number: NCT03983031

Rituximab for Obsessive-compulsive Disorder. (RITS-PO-2019)

This study evaluates the addition of rituximab to 12 patients diagnosed with treatment resistant obsessive-compulsive disorder in an open trial.

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Key information

Age range

18 year–40 year

Sex eligibility

All sexes

Study type

Interventional

Phase

Phase 1

Primary location

Region Örebro Län, Örebro, Sweden

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About this study

Immunological factors may be determinants for some psychiatric disorders, thus immunomodulation may be helpful. Rituximab (antibodies against CD20, cluster of differentiation), a standard treatment for multiple sclerosis, is an anti-inflammatory drug, hitherto not tested for psychiatric disorders.

The aim of this study is to investigate whether the psychiatric symptoms of treatment-resistant adult psychiatric patients, diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), are significantly improved after treatment with rituximab. The investigator's purpose is to implement recent insights from "Immunopsychiatry" to find efficacious, but still tolerable treatment for these patients.

This is a single-site, 20-week, open pilot, add-on treatment as usual, trial, where the patients will be followed for 1 year.

Rituximab will be administered with one single dose of 1000 mg. Investigators will analyse inflammatory and metabolic biomarkers in relation to the primary outcome, treatment response (defined as clinically relevant reduction in the validated measure Y-BOCS). Other outcomes are "much" or "very much improved" on Clinical Global Impression - Improvement scale (CGI-I) and change in Personal and Social Performance Scale measuring overall disability.

Who can participate

Healthy volunteers accepted: No

Only the study team can determine whether someone qualifies for participation.

Inclusion criteria

(Swedish citizens):

  • patient ages 18 to 40 years.
  • a duration of illness exceeding 2 years.
  • correspond to "Markedly ill", "Severely ill" or "Among the most extremely ill patients" on the Clinical Global Impression - Severity scale (CGI-S).
  • Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF) below 50.
  • obsessive-compulsive disorder according to The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5).
  • treatment resistance, i.e. failing to remit despite adequate treatments.
  • if female and with any risk for pregnancy, willing to use contraceptives.
  • if psychotropic treatment is prescribed the plasma concentrations of the drug must be tested and shown to be within therapeutic interval.
  • subjects should be judged by the investigator to be lucid and oriented to person, place, time, and situation when giving the informed consent.
  • immunoglobulin levels within the normal range.

Exclusion criteria

  • on-going immunomodulatory treatment.
  • pregnancy or breast-feeding.
  • weight below 40 kg.
  • clinically relevant on-going infection.
  • chronic infections .
  • positive screening test for hepatitis B, C, HIV or tuberculosis
  • any change of psychotropic medication within the previous 4 weeks
  • "much" or "very much" improved already at baseline according to CGI-I.
  • severe heart failure (NYHA grade IV) or other severe heart disease or history of cardiac arrhythmia or myocardial infarction.
  • unable to make an informed decision to consent to the trial.
  • in compulsory treatment.
  • treatment with clozapine within the last 2 months.
  • previous treatments with immunosuppressive agents.
  • malignancy currently or within 2 years prior to inclusion.

Treatment and study plan

Rituximab

Drug

Infusion

Primary outcomes

  1. Yale-Brown obsessive- compulsive scale (Y-BOCS)

    Time frame: week 20

    Y-BOCS maps symptoms and measures severity of obsessive-compulsive symptoms by a clinician. Y-BOCS has a range between 0 and 40 points, higher scores denotes worse symptoms. Outcome is measured as change in Y-BOCS score from baseline. At least 35% reduction in the score since baseline is defined as a response.

Secondary outcomes

  1. Personal and Social Performance Scale (PSP)

    Time frame: week 20

    Personal and Social Performance Scale (PSP) gives a score for disability. The PSP is a 100-point single-item rating scale (range 1-100), subdivided into 10 equal intervals. Lower scores denote lower functioning. The ratings are based mainly on the assessment of patient's functioning in four main areas: 1) socially useful activities; 2) personal and social relationships; 3) self-care; and 4) disturbing and aggressive behaviours. Change in score between enrolment and week 20 will be measured.

  2. Clinical Global Impression-severity (CGI-S) scale

    Time frame: week 20

    CGI-S is a clinician rated measure of overall clinical severity that is rated on a scale between 1 and 7. A person with no clinical complaints or problems will get a score of 1. The score 7 indicates the highest level of severity is phrased as "Among the most extremely ill patients".

  3. Clinical Global Impression-Improvement (CGI-I) in relation to inflammatory markers

    Time frame: week 20

    Clinical Global Impression-Improvement scale (CGI-I) measures change of symptoms on a 7 point Likert scale. A CGI-I score of 1 or 2 corresponds to be much or very much improved. Change in inflammatory markers in blood (gene expression and proteins) towards normality, in relation to clinical response (assessed by the clinician) will be measured.

  4. Clinical Global Impression-Improvement (CGI-I). Proportion of responders.

    Time frame: week 20

    Clinical Global Impression-Improvement scale (CGI-I) measures change of symptoms on a 7 point Likert scale. A CGI-I score of 1 or 2 corresponds to be much or very much improved. Three different informants base their CGI-I evaluations on independent assessments: a) The treating clinician, b) The patient's self-assessment and c) A next of kin. If the mean value of these three is below 2.5 then the patient will be regarded as a responder (representing much or very much improved since baseline).

  5. Clinical Global Impression-Improvement (CGI-I).

    Time frame: week 20

    Clinical Global Impression-Improvement scale (CGI-I) measures change of symptoms on a 7 point Likert scale. A CGI-I score of 1 or 2 corresponds to be much or very much improved. Three different informants base their CGI-I evaluations on independent assessments: a) The treating clinician, b) The patient's self-assessment and c) A next of kin. Range 3-21. A lower score depicts larger improvement.

  6. Adverse event: Any Adverse Reactions (AAR). Safety and tolerability of Rituximab

    Time frame: week 20

    Any Adverse reactions (AAR) is a rating scale developed for this study and is not a validated questionnaire. It consists of a list of 26 symptoms. AAR maps adverse events related to rituximab treatment. These items are assessed for severity on a Likert scale (4 levels: none; mild; moderate; severe) and frequency (3 levels: occasionally; daily; several times daily). AAR is assessed by the clinician. An adverse event scale was required as an outcome measure by the Swedish Medical Products Agency.

Other outcomes

  1. Yale-Brown obsessive- compulsive scale (Y-BOCS)

    Time frame: week 40

    Y-BOCS maps symptoms and measures severity of obsessive-compulsive symptoms by a clinician. Y-BOCS has a range between 0 and 40 points, higher scores denotes worse symptoms. Outcome is measured as change in Y-BOCS score from baseline. At least 35% reduction in the score since baseline is defined as a response.

  2. Personal and Social Performance Scale (PSP)

    Time frame: week 40

    Personal and Social Performance Scale (PSP) gives a score for disability. The PSP is a 100-point single-item rating scale (range 1-100), subdivided into 10 equal intervals. Lower scores denote lower functioning. The ratings are based mainly on the assessment of patient's functioning in four main areas: 1) socially useful activities; 2) personal and social relationships; 3) self-care; and 4) disturbing and aggressive behaviours. Change in score between enrolment and week 40 will be measured.

  3. Clinical Global Impression-severity (CGI-S) scale

    Time frame: week 40

    CGI-S is a clinician rated measure of overall clinical severity that is rated on a scale between 1 and 7. A person with no clinical complaints or problems will get a score of 1. The score 7 indicates the highest level of severity is phrased as "Among the most extremely ill patients".

  4. Clinical Global Impression-Improvement (CGI-I) in relation to inflammatory markers

    Time frame: week 40

    Clinical Global Impression-Improvement scale (CGI-I) measures change of symptoms on a 7 point Likert scale. A CGI-I score of 1 or 2 corresponds to be much or very much improved. Change in inflammatory markers in blood (gene expression and proteins) towards normality, in relation to clinical response (assessed by the clinician) will be measured.

  5. Changes in cognitive functioning

    Time frame: week 20

    Improvement in cognitive tests using a subset of tests included in Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS) (i.e. Block design, digit span, letter number sequencing and digit symbol coding, visuospatial test).

  6. CGI-I in relation to treatment and evaluated by the treating clinician, the patient's self-assessment and a next of kin

    Time frame: week 40

    Clinical Global Impression-Improvement scale (CGI-I) measures change of symptoms on a 7 point Likert scale. A CGI-I score of 1 or 2 corresponds to be much or very much improved. Three different informants base their CGI-I evaluations on independent assessments: a) The treating clinician, b) The patient's self-assessment and c) A next of kin. Range 3-21. A lower score depicts larger improvement.

  7. B cell subpopulations in relation to clinical response

    Time frame: week 20

    B-cell depletion at week 5, and B-cell subpopulations at week 20 in relation to clinical response (CGI-I) (assessed by the clinician) and baseline levels of B-cells.

  8. Life quality measured with Brunnsviken Brief Quality of Life Scale (BBQ)

    Time frame: week 40

    BBQ is a 12-item self-rated measurement of life satisfaction, it is a likert scale, range 0-48. Higher scores denote higher life satisfaction.

  9. Clinical Global Impression-Improvement (CGI-I). Proportion of responders.

    Time frame: week 40

    Clinical Global Impression-Improvement scale (CGI-I) measures change of symptoms on a 7 point Likert scale. A CGI-I score of 1 or 2 corresponds to be much or very much improved. Three different informants base their CGI-I evaluations on independent assessments: a) The treating clinician, b) The patient's self-assessment and c) A next of kin. If the mean value of these three is below 2.5 then the patient will be regarded as a responder (representing much or very much improved since baseline).

Sponsors and collaborators

Lead sponsor

Region Örebro County

Other

Collaborators

  • Örebro University, Sweden

Registry information

Official study title

Rituximab - Immunotherapy for Obsessive-compulsive Disorder: An Open Pilot Study

Important dates

Study start
2019
Primary completion
2022
Study completion
2022
First posted
Jun 12, 2019
Registry last updated
May 10, 2022

OpenTrials presents study information sourced from ClinicalTrials.gov. The official registry record should be consulted for the latest information.

View the official ClinicalTrials.gov record (opens in a new tab)

This listing is for discovery and informational purposes only. It is not medical advice, does not guarantee that a study is recruiting, and does not determine eligibility. Contact the study team and a qualified healthcare professional when considering participation.

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