Google anything about Leqembi, and you’ll almost certainly find the statistic that it slows memory decline by 27%. This finding in the clinical trial was statistically significant. Over the course of 18 months, those who were given Leqembi seemed to retain more of their cognitive abilities than their counterparts who were given a placebo. “This medication obviously is not a slam dunk,” says Trinh. “But heck, I’ll take 27% over nothing.” Many families of people with Alzheimer’s disease may feel similarly. They’ll take whatever improvement they can get. However, other experts point out that this measure—27% slower decline—can make the benefit sound more powerful than it really is. It’s what’s called a relative value as opposed to an absolute value. In the study, researchers used a cognitive test on which patients can score 0-18. The lower the score, the better the patient’s current cognitive function. At the end of the trial, patients who took a placebo scored an average of 4.86 points, while patients who received Leqembi scored 4.41. Representatives of PharmedOut, an organization that researches the influence of pharmaceutical marketing on the practice of medicine at Georgetown University, pointed out in a letter to the FDA that the difference between a score of 4.86 and 4.41 was not considered “clinically significant. “A minimal clinically meaningful difference is considered to be between 1.0 and 2.5 points, and the difference in this trial was 0.45. Moreover, there was no actual improvement, but only a slight difference in the extent of worsening, one that neither patients nor family would notice,” they write. Other experts have echoed the concerns.