First administration of new Alzheimer's drug scheduled for Monday

Taipei, June 20 (CNA) A new drug approved to treat Alzheimer's disease will be administered for the first time in Taiwan on Monday, Far Eastern Memorial Hospital in New Taipei announced Friday.

Kisunla, a treatment developed by U.S. pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly, will be administered in two doses to an 83-year-old female patient, the hospital said.

Kisunla and Leqembi are the first new treatments for Alzheimer's disease that target the underlying cause of the disease, rather than just its symptoms, according to the hospital.

Both drugs were approved by Taiwan's Food and Drug Administration earlier in 2025. Leqmebi was approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration in July 2023 while Kisunla got the green light in July 2024.

At the time the drugs were approved, Hu Chaur-jong (胡朝榮), Taipei Medical University Medical College dean and consulting neurologist to Shuang Ho Hospital, said most scientists believe Alzheimer's is caused in part by abnormal accumulation of amyloid beta protein inside the brain.

The two drugs help Alzheimer's patients in the early stages of the disease to reduce amyloid plaques in the brain, allowing for improvements in a patient's condition.

Earlier in June, Yan Sui-hing (甄瑞興), director of Far Eastern Memorial Hospital's dementia center, said the drugs need to be administered for a year to 18 months before the amyloid accumulation is removed.

Yan cautioned that the drugs are not a cure, and that amyloid levels must be monitored, indicating that treatment would be needed to resume if amyloid accumulation surpassed a certain threshold.

Because the new drugs have only recently been introduced, their effectiveness and potential side effects still needed to be evaluated, he added.

There are around 350,000 dementia patients in Taiwan, with 60-70 percent suffering from Alzheimer's. Of those, about half are estimated to be eligible for the new drugs, which is fewer than 100,000 people, according to Yan.