Diabetes is a disease of insulin deficiency associated with hyperglycemia (high blood glucose). Hypertension (high blood pressure) is a common comorbid condition of diabetes. These factors place people with diabetes at high risk for developing long-term complications including: diabetic nephropathy, the leading cause of end-stage renal disease; retinopathy, the leading cause of blindness and visual disability; and cardiovascular disease, which is responsible for some 65% of deaths in people with diabetes.

Research implicates Connective Tissue Growth Factor (CTGF) as an underlying pathological factor driving the development of the long-term complications of diabetes. Studies show that CTGF mediates the damaging effects of hyperglycemia and hypertension, leading to proteinuria and fibrosis, which accelerate kidney failure in people with diabetic nephropathy. In diabetic eye disease, high levels of CTGF are correlated with the damaging effects of neovascularization and fibrosis, which cause vision loss. Similarly, levels of CTGF in the heart and in the circulation are correlated with cardiovascular disease, and CTGF expression is reduced by therapies that provide benefit in improving cardiovascular function

FibroGen is developing FG-3019, a fully human monoclonal antibody to CTGF, for the prevention and treatment of diabetic nephropathy. FibroGen expects the therapeutic benefit of anti-CTGF therapy in diabetic nephropathy would be to extend life and the time to dialysis by reducing early-stage pathologies related to hyperglycemia and hypertension, including hyperfiltration and kidney hypertrophy, and by preventing the development of proteinuria and chronic fibrosis. In addition, administration of anti-CTGF therapy during the early stages of diabetic nephropathy may help prevent the onset of, or reduce the severity of, cardiovascular diseases and retinopathy, which frequently accompany progression to end-stage renal disease.

Read more about the development of FG-3019.

Read more about diabetic nephropathy and FibroGen's anti-CTGF therapeutic approach.

Read more about anti-CTGF therapy for the treatment of ocular diseases.