FDA approves AstraZeneca’s Movantik for opioid-induced constipation

The US Food and Drug Administration yesterday approved Movantik (naloxegol), an oral treatment for opioid-induced constipation in adults with chronic non-cancer pain from Anglo-Swedish pharma major AstraZeneca (LSE: AZN).

Movantik is expected to be available to patients in the first half of 2015, said AstraZeneca. It is currently a schedule II controlled substance because it is structurally related to noroxymorphone, and is also under review by the European Medicines Agency.

“Supportive care products such as Movantik can lessen the constipating side effects of opioids,” said Julie Beitz, director of the Office of Drug Evaluation III in the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research.