MND-SMART opens in Salford

The trial will be based at the Salford Royal, Greater Manchester, and run by the Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust. It will welcome participants to the study from across the Greater Manchester region.

Dr Hisham Hamdalla is the Consultant Neurologist leading the study at the new Centre.

The first three MND-SMART trial centres opened in Edinburgh at the beginning of March, Dundee in August and Glasgow in October.

People with MND who have already registered online interest in the trial and who live in the Greater Manchester region, will be contacted by the trial team over the coming months to discuss taking part.

“We are delighted to be able to offer our patients the opportunity to take part in this important research. Being diagnosed with MND is devastating and our current treatments only have limited benefit. The MND-SMART trial now offers us a way to assess alternative drugs that could slow down or stop the progression of the MND and greatly benefit people living with this condition.”

MND-SMART is a pioneering clinical trial in its reach and design that launched in January 2020. The trial is recruiting hundreds of people living with MND across the UK to take part in tests of potential treatments.

Unlike typical clinical trials which test a single treatment at a time, MND-SMART is testing multiple drugs and so aims to speed up the time it takes to find medicines that can slow, stop, or reverse the progression of, MND.

The trial has been developed by people with MND and clinical trial experts from across the UK. The study is led by the Euan MacDonald Centre for MND Research at the University of Edinburgh.

MND-SMART is funded by the Euan MacDonald Centre, substantial private donations, MND Scotland and the My Name’5 Doddie Foundation.

Since the announcement of the trial’s launch, more than 1000 people with MND from across the UK have registered their interest in taking part in the trial.