WhelWomen's Health Evidence Lab
WHEL-C-057 · Emerging evidence · 3.8/10

Leuprolide for menopause

Per Open Targets, LEUPROLIDE is a Phase 1 clinical candidate for menopause acting as a gonadotropin-releasing hormone receptor agonist.

Origin · Existing drug · repurposing candidatePathway · 505(b)(2) · existing active ingredient, new indicationEvidence arm · Pathway insightsEvidence supports
How to read thisThe summary above and the proposed mechanism are generated by the model from the sources it ingested, and are written as the model’s reasoning rather than established fact. Any figure quoted from MATRIX is a model-derived association score, not a clinical measurement. How far the published record backs this pair is carried by the score’s own rigor dimension and traced to verbatim sources at the foot of the page.

Hypothesized mechanism

LEUPROLIDE acts as a GnRH receptor agonist, modulating the hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal axis relevant to menopause-related hormonal changes.

This is the model’s proposed mechanism from the sources on file, not a demonstrated causal pathway. How well the published record supports it is reflected in the rigor and plausibility dimensions of the score, and traced to the verbatim sources at the foot of the page.

How the score was reached, for this pair

The composite score is the sum of five dimensions, each scored 0 to 2 by the model from the evidence on file. Below is the sub-score this specific pair received on each, with what that dimension measures. It scored 3.8 of 10 overall, a emerging reading, from a pathway rated emerging in strength.

The model’s overall reasoning for this pair is the summary at the top of the page, and the mechanism it proposed is in the section above.

Pathway arm · anchors the headline3.8 / 10 · Emerging

Scored for women. Female representation not stated — applicability to women uncertain (flagged for full text). (band F4, ×0.75).

Corroboration

Only a single line of evidence is provided: an Open Targets database entry stating LEUPROLIDE is a GnRH receptor agonist clinical candidate. No independent mechanistic lines converge to support the claim.

0 / 2

Rigor

The evidence is a curated database record citing a PHASE_1 clinical stage rather than experimental data, providing only target-level annotation. There is no human outcome data or model results, but the clinical-candidate status implies some human-relevant context.

1 / 2

Specificity

The claim names a precise molecular target and action: LEUPROLIDE acts as a gonadotropin-releasing hormone receptor agonist on the GnRH receptor. This is a specific, well-defined pharmacological mechanism.

2 / 2

Plausibility

GnRH receptor agonism plausibly relates to reproductive/hormonal axis modulation, but the link to menopause as a target phenotype is not mechanistically elaborated in the single claim. The target-phenotype fit is only generically supported by the database listing.

1 / 2

Consistency

With only one mechanistic signal there is no conflict, but also no convergence to demonstrate consistency. The lone Open Targets annotation cannot be cross-checked against other directional signals.

1 / 2
How the scoring rubric works, in general

Regulatory & development status

Where this candidate sits in the US regulatory landscape: whether the drug is already FDA-approved for menopause (on-label) or approved for something else (off-label), whether the molecule is available as a generic or a single-source brand still under patent, and how far it has been studied as a therapy for this condition. Each fact is drawn from a public US source and reported beside the score; none of it is folded into the score.

This is descriptive context, not regulatory advice. It maps the landscape a 505(b)(2)route would build on (an already-approved active ingredient proposed for a new indication), but it is not a 505(b)(2) viability assessment, and says nothing about whether any particular development path is advisable. “Approved” means FDA-approved (US); approvals elsewhere are out of scope.

Approval relationship Off-label

Read from the drug’s FDA label via DailyMed, the US National Library of Medicine’s label repository. A label is only counted when it carries an FDA-approved marketing category (an NDA, ANDA, or biologic BLA); dietary supplements, homeopathics, and OTC-monograph products are not FDA-approved drugs and are excluded.

For this pair. The drug has an FDA-approved label, but for a different indication, so using it for this condition would be off-label.

Generic & patent supply Generic available

Read from the FDA Orange Book (Approved Drug Products with Therapeutic Equivalence Evaluations), using single-ingredient products only so that patents on novel branded combination formulations are never attributed to the base molecule.

For this molecule. A live ANDA lists this active ingredient, so the basic molecule is available as a generic (off-patent in its basic form).

CAMCEVI ETM · NDA (brand) · EQ 21MG BASE · rx · approved Aug 25, 2025
CAMCEVI KIT · NDA (brand) · EQ 42MG BASE · rx · approved May 25, 2021
LEUPROLIDE ACETATE FOR DEPOT SUSPENSION · NDA (brand) · 22.5MG/VIAL · rx · approved Aug 28, 2018
VIADUR · NDA (brand) · EQ 65MG BASE · discn · approved Mar 3, 2000
LUPRON DEPOT · NDA (brand) · 3.75MG/VIAL **Federal Register determination that product was not discontinued or withdrawn for safety or effectiveness reasons** · discn · approved Oct 22, 1990

Clinical-trial stage, for this condition studied

Read from ClinicalTrials.gov (US National Library of Medicine). A trial only counts when the drug appears as an experimental or active-comparator intervention in an interventional study of this condition; mechanistic, drug-interaction, post-marketing (Phase 4), and comparator-background uses are excluded, so this reflects the drug being tested as a therapy for menopause.

For this pair. Studied in 1 qualifying interventional trial · highest stage reached no phase listed · completed.

NCT02927392 · completed
The regulatory and trial sources this status is drawn from

Layers not covered for this pair

Sex-specific pharmacokineticsNone on file

Not covered for this pair. This layer holds documented sex-specific pharmacokinetics for a limited set of drugs, and this compound is not among them yet. A blank here means the drug is not covered by the layer, not that no sex difference exists.

More on the sex-specific pharmacokinetics layer and its sources
Cycle-phase dependenceNone on file

Not covered for this pair. The cycle-phase layer is seeded for the strongest-evidence cases so far (PMDD), and this pair is not among them yet. A blank here means the pair is not covered by the layer, not that the effect was found to be phase-independent.

More on the cycle-phase layer and its sources

Source evidence · what the pipeline ingested

These are the sources the pipeline ingested to detect and score this signal, the published literature the model actually read, each tagged by study type. Where the model combined findings the claim is marked as a synthesis (S), and where the literature disagrees the contradiction is shown (!).

Every source below belongs to this signal’s evidence arm, Pathway insights. Whel reads each drug-condition pair through four such arms, each held to its own inclusion bar; a signal is surfaced through one of them.

  • 1Per Open Targets (retrieved 2026-06-16), LEUPROLIDE (a Protein) is a clinical candidate for menopause (maximum clinical stage PHASE_1); its mechanism of action is Gonadotropin-releasing hormone receptor agonist on target gonadotropin releasing hormone receptor. Open Targets · mechanistic

These are the verbatim sources the pipeline surfaced and read; they may not be the full published record for a pair, and the score reflects the strength and agreement of the evidence rather than its volume. The strength of these source types is what the rigor dimension of the score reads off. MATRIX, sex-specific pharmacokinetics, and cycle phase are separate layers the pipeline does not ingest, external cross-references reported beside the score, and they link to their own sources in their sections above.

The primary sources and pipelines this evidence is drawn from