Agios Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:AGIO) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Brian Goff: Thank you Greg.

Operator: Your next question is from the line of Danielle Brill from Raymond James. Your line is open.

Alex: Hey guys, this is Alex on for Danielle. Another question on 946 ahead of MDS data. Just curious about your updated thoughts on how big you think the thrombocytopenia risk is as a toxicity signal. I know you’re not using the same dose where it emerged, but was kind of curious if there’s anything particular about MDS that could make these patients more susceptible to that signal. Thanks so much.

Sarah Gheuens: Sure, thanks for the question. To start with the second part of your question, thrombocytopenia is indeed more common in patients living with MDS because they can be prone to develop pancytopenia, which includes a decrease in platelets as part of their disease, and indeed many of the therapies have thromobocytopenia as an additional adverse event reported. To your point, we did observe thrombocytopenia at the high dose, the 20 milligram dose in healthy volunteers. Right now, we are studying 5 milligrams in the MDS patient population and we’re working to really understand the safety profile and efficacy profile of the drug, so more to come on that after we have a database lock.

Brian Goff: And Sarah often adds the phrase that this is–it’s monitorable, it’s manageable, and it’s reversible, which is very encouraging as well.

Sarah Gheuens: Indeed. That’s the thing we hear, really, from physicians as well, because this is something that actually occurs within the organ system that they’ve very comfortable with. They’re treating all of these hematological conditions. The fact that thrombocytopenia is something that can be picked up on lab draws and then mitigated by a potential discontinuation is a very reassuring thing.

Operator: Thank you. Now I would like to turn the call back to Brian Goff for closing comments.

Brian Goff: Well, thank you all very much for participating in today’s call. As you heard this morning, our team has great conviction in our potential to deliver transformative new therapies for patients and significant long term value for shareholders. I’m really proud of the efforts, the continued efforts from our team. We appreciate your interest in Agios and very much look forward to speaking with you soon. Thanks a lot.

Operator: This concludes today’s conference call. We thank all for participating. You may disconnect.