Patients attempting diy clinical drugs to combat long wait for approved drugs

The Wall Street Journal (4/16, A2, Marcus, Subscription Publication) reports that some patients with Lou Gehrig's disease are attempting to create their own experimental clinical drugs at home and are testing them on themselves. The Journal notes that these attempts at homemade clinical drugs are driven by the frustration among Lou Gehrig's disease patients over the slow pace of clinical drug trials or by the fact that they are unable to qualify. The story notes that many of these patients believe that experimenting with do-it-yourself drugs is worth the risk, because the average life expectancy after being diagnosed with the disease is only about two to five years.