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ORPHA:280219

Pelizaeus-Merzbacher disease, classic form

high confidenceSubtype of disorder

Also known as: Classic PMD

Publications

54

42.3th percentile

Trials

0

Interventional, condition-specific

Researchers

283

Distinct authors in sample

Gene link

—

Readiness

2/6

Stages with a signal

Clinical definition (Orphanet)

The classic form of Pelizaeus-Merzbacher disease (PMD) is the form of PMD.

How rare: 1-9 / 1 000 000 — roughly one to nine people per million. In a city the size of Kolkata, perhaps a few dozen.

Orphanet entry

Cross-references

Joined from Mondo / Orphanet. MeSH labels may enter searches; UMLS / OMIM / NCIT are stored for reference.

Additional Mondo synonyms (1)

classic PMD

Research stages

Trial readiness signals

Where this condition sits on an open-data research pipeline — not how close a treatment is, and not medical advice. Empty stages often mean “not in these databases under this Mondo ID,” not “impossible.”

2/6 stages with a signal

Research-stage checklist from open sources (GenCC, literature, Monarch when enriched, ClinicalTrials.gov). Not a prognosis or care recommendation.

  1. Gene identifiedNot found

    No GenCC disease–gene assertion in this build

  2. LiteraturePresent

    54 matched papers (33 in last 10 years) Source

  3. Phenotype characterisedPresent

    27 HPO annotations (e.g. Nystagmus; Delayed speech and language development; Ataxia) Source

  4. Animal modelNot found

    No Alliance genotype “model of” associations via Monarch for these Mondo IDs

  5. Orphan designationNot found

    No FDA or EMA orphan-drug designation matched this disease via UMLS or preferred name Source

  6. Interventional trialNot found

    No matched interventional trial under our ClinicalTrials.gov rules

Biology

Genes and phenotypes

Gene–disease validity from GenCC, plus phenotypes and animal models joined from Monarch Initiative via Mondo ID — not a clinical diagnosis aid.

Do we know what causes it?

Not yet — the cause hasn't been pinned down in GenCC.

No strong gene–disease assertion joined for this Orphanet entity.

Phenotypes (Monarch / HPO)

27

Associated phenotypes · MONDO:0017222

  • Nystagmus
  • Delayed speech and language development
  • Ataxia
  • Mild intellectual disability
  • Global developmental delay

Showing 5 of 27 — open Monarch for the full list.

Animal models (Monarch / Alliance)

None returned for this Mondo ID. Empty here is not proof that no model organism work exists under another name or gene.

Monarch fetch 2026-07-29

Therapies

Designations, candidates, and chemicals

FDA OOPD and EMA orphan designations, Open Targets clinical candidates, and CTD chemical associations via MyDisease.info. These never change the interventional-trial headline.

Orphan designation (FDA · EMA)

No designation matched this disease via UMLS or preferred name on the FDA OOPD mirror or EMA orphan register. Absence here is not proof that none exists under another wording.

Open Targets candidates

No drugs or clinical candidates returned for this Mondo ID on Open Targets.

CTD chemicals (MyDisease.info)

No CTD chemical associations returned for this Mondo ID.

Literature

Is anyone studying this?

54

54 papers have ever been published on this condition (under this name). For scale, breast cancer has over 700,000. Median papers in the last 10 years for a rare disease in this dataset (publications denominator n=3967) is 59.

54 papers since the earliest indexed year in this search — median last-10-year count for a rare disease in this dataset is 59 (publications denominator n=3967).

33 in the last 10 years · high confidence · 42.3th percentile (publications denominator)

Phrase hits: 54 · MeSH hits: 0

Open Europe PMC search

Who's working on it?

283

Distinct author names in 54 sampled papers — named people below.

Who's working on it?

No interventional trial matched this name; these authors publish on it in the sampled literature — a practical starting point for contact.

  1. 01
    Bertini E3 papers · 2021

    Unit of Neuromuscular and Neurodegenerative Diseases, Department of Neuroscience, IRCCS Bambino Gesù Children's Hospital, 00146 Rome, Italy.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  2. 02
    Goldman SA3 papers · 2018

    Center for Translational Neuromedicine, University of Rochester Medical Center, Rochester, NY 14642, USA; Center for Neuroscience, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Copenhagen, 2200 Copenhagen, Denmark.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  3. 03
    Wang J3 papers · 2022

    Department of Pediatrics, Peking University First Hospital, Beijing, China.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  4. 04
    Aiello C2 papers · 2021

    Unit of Neuromuscular and Neurodegenerative Diseases, Department of Neuroscience, IRCCS Bambino Gesù Children's Hospital, 00146 Rome, Italy.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  5. 05
    Biancheri R2 papers · 2014

    Child Neurology and Psychiatry Unit.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  6. 06
    Filocamo M2 papers · 2014
    Papers in Europe PMC
  7. 07
    Gärtner J2 papers · 2010
    Papers in Europe PMC
  8. 08
    Gu Q2 papers · 2022

    Department of Pediatrics, Peking University First Hospital, Beijing, China.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  9. 09
    Henneke M2 papers · 2010

    Department of Pediatrics and Pediatric Neurology, Georg August University, Robert Koch Str. 40, 37075 Göttingen, Germany.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  10. 10
    Inoue K2 papers · 2017

    Department of Mental Retardation and Birth Defect Research, National Institute of Neuroscience, National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry Kodaira, Japan.

    Papers in Europe PMC

Clinical research

Is a treatment being tested?

0

interventional trials for this specific condition

No interventional trial testing a treatment matched this specific condition name on ClinicalTrials.gov (observational studies and pan-disease registries are listed separately when present).

Data as of 11 September 2026 · last trial check 11 September 2026

No matched interventional trials. This is true for 77.2% of diseases in the trials denominator (5501 of 7126). Here are the researchers publishing on it.

high confidence · 38.6th percentile (trials denominator)

Recruiting interventional trials

From the matched ClinicalTrials.gov set

No interventional trial testing a treatment was found for this specific condition name on ClinicalTrials.gov.

See who's working on it — people publishing on this disease are often the practical next contact when no trial is listed.

Other registries (secondary)

Broader net from EU CTIS, ISRCTN, and ICTRP when available — deduped against ClinicalTrials.gov IDs already counted above. Dual-model LLM relevance gates what we keep. These rows are not added to the interventional headline.

raw 2 · after dedupe 2 · already on CT.gov 0 · kept 0 · parent 0 · uncertain 2 · dropped 0 · fetched 2026-07-30

Source notes: ictrp: Error: ICTRP public search unavailable (WHO portal is SPA-only; SOAP needs partnership). Tried: https://apps.who.int/tri

No secondary-registry studies passed dual-model relevance for this condition name (after dedupe).

Uncertain / not reviewed (2)

Where to find support

Condition-specific patient organisations, when Orphanet lists them, are on the disease’s Orphanet page. We also link umbrella groups that support undiagnosed and ultra-rare families.

Orphanet entry for Pelizaeus-Merzbacher disease, classic form — check Associations / patient organisations on that page.

India — NPRD

Last verified 2026-07-26

This ORPHAcode is not on our curated NPRD list (direct or Mondo-parent match). That does not decide clinical eligibility; families in India should ask a notified Centre of Excellence about current coverage.

Hand-curated for this project. ORPHAcode mappings are best-effort and may be incomplete or imprecise for umbrella categories. Parent (Mondo) matches mean the policy lists a broader category — confirm eligibility with a Centre of Excellence. Financial entitlements summarised from public policy statements and may change. This is not official government guidance.

How we counted this

Europe PMC query (preferred label + any corrected label + Orphanet and Mondo exact synonyms, stoplisted; unioned with resolved MeSH labels when available). UMLS / OMIM / NCIT cross-references are stored on the overview but are not added to the query string.

"Pelizaeus-Merzbacher disease, classic form" OR "Classic PMD"

Run this search on Europe PMC

ClinicalTrials.gov query (quoted phrases + MeSH via query.cond, plus recall-expansion terms when used):

"Pelizaeus-Merzbacher disease, classic form" OR "Classic PMD"

Study-type breakdown: 0 interventional · 0 observational · 0 expanded access. Only interventional studies enter the trial headline.

Query health: ok — strategies attempted: phrase; with hits: phrase

Run this search on ClinicalTrials.gov

Confidence reasoning

  • Preferred label is multi-word and distinctive
  • No synonyms dropped by stoplist
  • No label/synonym collisions with other diseases in this corpus

Ingested 2026-07-27T11:51:07.111Z