大象传媒

A controversial drug to treat Alzheimer鈥檚 disease has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration in the United States.

Aducanumab is the first new treatment since 2003 and the first to attack the disease process.. but its road to approval has not been straightforward. Early clinical trials starting around six years ago produced both negative and positive results for the drug.

So how important is this - and is it a real hope for people living with Alzheimer's?

Dr. Ronald Petersen, is an expert in the disease and a director of the Mayo Clinic Research Centre.

"Potentially it's huge. Potentially... This is the first disease-modifying therapy that's ever been approved so that's what we've been lacking in the field - we've had symptomatic drugs but not drugs that get at the underlying-disease process."

(Photo: An Alzheimer's patient in China. Credit: Getty Images)