Neurocrine Biosciences, maker of the first drug approved by the FDA to treat tardive dyskinesia, continues to throw its weight behind efforts to improve screening, monitoring and general awareness of the neurological disorder.
Neurocrine is ringing in Tardive Dyskinesia Awareness Week—which takes place during the first full week of May and so kicked off on Sunday—by helping to conduct initiatives across the U.S. that are aimed at encouraging routine screening for TD, improving recognition of the condition and decreasing the stigma around it, according to a company announcement Monday.
As part of its support for the weeklong awareness push, Neurocrine directed patients and doctors to its many resources devoted to the disorder: The TD Awareness page on Neurocrine’s website and the standalone site for its long-running “Talk About TD” campaign both offer a range of information to educate patients and their caregivers and loved ones about the condition and guide their conversations about it, while Neurocrine’s faculty-led MIND-TD site is aimed at providing doctors with clinical data and guidance around recognizing, diagnosing and treating TD.
“The majority of people living with TD remain undiagnosed, reinforcing the importance of proactive recognition and treatment of the condition,” Eiry Roberts, M.D., Neurocrine’s chief medical officer, said in a statement. “We are committed to partnering with all stakeholders during TD Awareness Week and beyond to advocate for routine screenings for patients at risk for TD.”
TD is a movement disorder that’s associated with the use of antipsychotic medications prescribed to treat depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and other mental illnesses, and which causes involuntary movements like lip-smacking, grimacing, “piano fingers” and more. It’s estimated to affect around 600,000 people in the U.S., though Neurocrine cited data suggesting that only about one-third have been diagnosed with the condition.
The company collaborated with the Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute on a report released earlier this year that called for the increased use of measurement-based care by mental health clinicians as a way to improve the early detection and diagnosis rate of TD among their patients using antipsychotics.
Neurocrine’s work to boost awareness and treatment of TD comes several years after its Ingrezza became in 2017 the first drug approved by the FDA to treat adults with the disorder; Teva’s Austedo earned the second such nod just a few months later. Both drugs’ DTC ad launches arrived in similarly quick succession in 2021, though Neurocrine had kicked off “Talk About TD” as an unbranded awareness campaign in early 2019.