New research venture aims to lower cost of medicines

Published: 13-Nov-2014

Research in Medicines Design will lead projects to understand and improve how drugs are delivered and absorbed by the body


A new research collaboration aims to open up the pharmaceutical drugs market and enable the design of better and cheaper medicines, according to scientists involved in the project at the University of Bath in the UK.

The research consortium, Research in Medicines Design (ReMedDes), will lead projects aimed at understanding and improving how different locally acting drugs (skin, nasal, inhaled) are delivered and absorbed by the body.

Current projects include creating the next generation of orally inhaled and nasal products that will tailor delivery of medicines in the treatment of asthma and allergic rhinitis, and improve the current inefficient delivery of drugs to both the skin and nails, enhancing treatments for diseases such as psoriasis and onychomycosis.

By designing generic copies of formulations of drugs, for which patents have lapsed, the researchers also hope to be able dramatically to reduce medicine costs in the UK and abroad.

The consortium's overall objective is to undertake research that facilitates the creation of better and less expensive medicines

To date, the availability of generic drugs has been limited because it has been difficult to formulate products with exactly the same, or ‘bioequivalent’, effects. But the ReMedDes team is using its expertise to ensure that bioequivalent medicines are just as effective as the original versions.

Work in this area has already included an understanding of how respiratory product, Advair, a combination of a corticosteroid and a long-acting ß2 agonist, is absorbed and eliminated by the body differently, depending on where in the lung it is delivered.

Collaboration between ReMedDes and the US FDA marks the first time an institution outside the US has received funding from the agency, aligning the research closely with new priorities under the Affordable Care Act and funding Under the Generic Drug User Fee Amendments (GDUFA) law of 2012.

Professor Richard Guy of Bath University’s Department of Pharmacy & Pharmacology said the consortium's overall objective is to undertake research that facilitates the creation of better and less expensive medicines. The approach uses multi-disciplinary research to improve formulations to increase the rate and extent of drug absorption at its site of administration.

More than US$1.2bn of FDA funding complements additional funding partnerships for ReMedDes with major pharmaceutical companies, including GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer and Genentech.

Professor Guy added: 'Ultimately, the strategy is to develop a suite of in vitro experimental research tools and in silico (mathematical) models, to direct the rational design and optimisation of high-performance pharmaceutical formulations.'

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