DUBAI — An infant born with an extremely rare form of genetic epilepsy has gone from suffering a seizure approximately every 13 minutes to being seizure-free following treatment with an experimental drug at King's College Hospital London in Dubai, according to reporting by the Khaleej Times.
The patient, Adnan, began experiencing seizures from the first day of his life — roughly 110 per day. His condition was addressed through a "compassionate use" pathway after the Dubai Health Authority (DHA) approved an application submitted by the hospital, allowing access to a medication that is not otherwise cleared for commercial use.
The drug, known as ABS-1230, is an oral medication still in experimental stages. It is designed to act on abnormal activity within an ion channel linked to the rare genetic epilepsy from which Adnan suffers. According to data from the treatment's developer, Adnan is the youngest patient worldwide to receive ABS-1230 and the second infant ever to be given the medication.
Physicians at the Dubai hospital sequenced Adnan's entire genome, a process that uncovered the gene variant responsible for his seizures. That finding enabled the care team to determine that ABS-1230 could serve as a viable treatment.
The drug was administered on September 14th under the direction of Professor Ubaid Shah, a consultant pediatric neurologist and epileptologist at the hospital. The response was immediate and pronounced: Adnan was discharged with his family one week later, having recorded no seizures during that period.
"This is an exceptional moment for us, and it highlights what precision medicine can achieve when we are able to identify the genetic cause of a disease and choose a treatment that targets the mechanism linked to it," Professor Shah told the Khaleej Times.
At a follow-up appointment on October 11th, Adnan exhibited no clinical seizures. The hospital confirmed that he remained seizure-free as of November 2nd, and the infant has begun reaching some early developmental milestones.
"Despite the encouraging response, we will continue to monitor his condition closely to assess whether the results are sustained and whether the experimental treatment is safe," Professor Shah told the Khaleej Times.
Professor Shah and his colleagues emphasized that ABS-1230 remains experimental and requires further research before it can be approved for public use. Nevertheless, they noted that Adnan's response to the treatment has been overwhelmingly positive.
