Chelsea says data on hypotension drug positive, shares soar

(Reuters) - Chelsea Therapeutics' (CHTP.O) shares jumped as much as 36 percent after it said additional analysis from a late-stage trial of its drug Droxidopa, which missed the main goal of the study last week, showed significant symptomatic benefit in treating a neurological disorder.

Chelsea is developing the drug as a treatment for symptomatic neurogenic orthostatic hypotension (NOH) -- a neurological disorder that causes blood pressure to drop when the afflicted person assumes a standing position.

With the exception of vision, the drug showed a marked improvement over the dummy drug for each of the five other symptoms measured by dizziness, weakness, fatigue, concentration, and head/neck pain, Chelsea said in a statement on Thursday.

The company, which plans to report results from a second late-stage trial in the same indication later this quarter, expects the outcome of the trial to be enhanced by the washout period, where it will stop dosing patients for seven days.

In the first late-stage trial all patients received the drug during the initial open label titration phase. Patients who responded to the drug at any of the doses were kept on the treatment for at least 7 days.

Following this, half the responder group was put on the drug daily for two weeks, while the rest got a dummy drug.

Shares of the company, which lost about 75 percent of their market value last week, touched a high of $3.42, making them one of the top percentage gainers on Nasdaq. The shares were trading up 32 percent at $3.32 Thursday.

(Reporting by Anand Basu in Bangalore; Editing by Aradhana Aravindan)