Enhancing Brain Repair with Metformin (Metformin in CP)

Contact
Nisha Kapil
Email

Children with cerebral palsy who were born premature face a lifetime of motor impairments, some of which can be treated with physiotherapy. Recent findings suggest that the drug metformin could help motor recovery by recruiting stem cells in the brain to help repair injury. Here, we will evaluate whether metformin combined with physiotherapy enhances motor and thinking skills in children with cerebral palsy.

Research theme:
BRIGHT Beginnings: Projects to optimize brain and developmental outcomes

Age range: 
5­–12 years

Start date:
June 2016

Principal Investigators: 
Dr. Donald J. Mabbott, SickKids
Dr. Darcy Fehlings, Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital

External links:
Visit the CP Discovery Lab

2020-21 Project Update

2019-20 Project Update

Our team has taken significant strides towards our goal of determining if metformin can be used as part of our intervention for children diagnosed with cerebral palsy (CP).

We started the year validating our study to ensure all was being performed in a safe environment and according to Health Canada’s regulations. Following confirmation of this, we officially launched our study in November 2019 to great interest from the CP community. This interest has continued despite the COVID-19 pandemic-related shutdown because of our fantastic partners and advocates within this community. Since then, we have broadened several entry criteria to increase the number of children who can participate, without sacrificing the safety of participants or the quality of results. We also added two highly qualified research assistants and several physiotherapists to our team, thereby increasing our capacity to enroll participants and effectively run our study.

Despite the shutdown, we continue to screen interested families for eligibility so we can enrol participants once in-person research activities can resume. We are also working with several CP-related organizations to increase community awareness and reach as many individuals as possible.

We continue to work with our fantastic Stakeholder Engagement Committee, which is composed of youth and adults with CP, as well as parents of children diagnosed with CP, to tailor our trial to the needs of children and families in the CP community. Based on their advice we will hold in-person information sessions for families to learn about our study, ask questions, and express their needs. We are excited to conduct study procedures in the coming months as restrictions are lifted, and have several families ready for their screening visit, and even more ready to continue the screening process.

Project News