The Economics of Drug Development
The charts below illustrate the cost of drug development, research, and development
funding. The data is not restricted to cancer drugs, but the key points are applicable
to cancer drug development.
- Costs are
increasing
- Pharmaceutical
research and
development (R&D)
exceeds federal
National Institute of
Health spending
- Federal R&D
spending is leveling
off, although
pharmaceutical
company spending
continues to
increase
- The clinical trial 'pipeline' is
clogged
Drug developers are considering a variety of ways to help improve the clinical trial
logjam. One company has formed a partnership with M.D. Anderson Cancer Center
and other centers to test drugs using the large banks of tumor tissue each institution
has collected. That way, the company can figure out which types of tumors a drug
might affect before it embarks on human testing.
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Another potential
solution to the drug
logjam is to run
adaptive clinical
trials, where the
criteria for success
would be adjusted
as results come in.
Based on early
responses, doctors
might recruit
different types of
patients midway
through a trial. |
