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Cara Therapeutics is a publicly held biotechnology company based in Stamford, Connecticut that was founded in 2004 by Derek Chalmers, Frederique Menzaghi, and Michael E. Lewis. It is focused on developing therapeutics to treat pain, inflammation, and pruritus. This is done by selectively targeting peripheral kappa opiod receptors (KORs).
Cara is developing a proprietary class of product candidates that target the body's peripheral nervous system and have demonstrated initial efficacy in patients with moderate-to-severe pain and pruritus (itch) without inducing many of the side effects typically associated with other pain and itch therapeutics.
Cara's lead product candidate, CR845, is a potent peripheral kappa opiod receptor agonist with high selectivity over other opiod receptors in the body. It exhibits potent analgesic, anti-inflammatory, and anti-pruritic (anti-itch) properties in both human and animals. In addition, CR845 is intrinsically poor at penetrating the blood-brain barrier and therefore, has shown little side effects such as nausea/vomitting, sedation, respiratory depression, abuse, addiction, or euphoria.
The product, Korsuva, has been formulated both as an IV and oral formulation and is being studied for acute pain, chronic pain, and uremic pruritus (itch). An injectible version of Korsuva is ready for commercialization, while the oral version for Puritus CKD and Pruritus CLD are in Phase 3 and Phase 2 of clinical studies respectively. An IV Difelikefalin version of CR845 is ready for commercialization for use in post-op settings and another oral Difelikefalin version has completed Phase 3 clinical studies for chronic pain and is progressing to commercialization.
Cara also has a product in preclinical development. CR701 selectively modulates CB receptors without targeting CNS cannabinoid receptors. It is intended to be developed as a therapeutic approach for neuropathic pain. The product has been evaluated in rodent models of neuropathic pain that produces both hyperalgesia (sensitization of nerve endings to painful stimuli) and allodynia (painful perception of innocuous stimuli) comparable to human conditions.
