Healthcare News by GLG Council Members

By leapfrogging incremental improvement in Pfizer's oral portfolio, VP head Corey Goodman is starting to deliver on his promise to revamp the way that Pfizer approaches drug development. While the recent acquisition of Dimebon was a mediocre stopgap in their approach to Alzheimer's, a dedicated approach to Regenerative Medicine should provide longterm growth in multiple therapeutic areas including...

Many studies support EGFR response correlates with rash Many attempts to actually increase the incidence of rash Most patients will use the EGFR treatments despite the rash

1.    The study is valid, and the data are believable.  However, the question is whether the use of erbitux, an extremely expensive agent, is optimal in this context.  Should it be given at relapse?  Should it only be given to patients with kras mutation?  Given its toxicity and expense, I would not prescribe it to everyone with lung cancer. 2.    The...

The study was presented at the AHA Meeting.  Statistics were presented on 3 of the most prescribed NSAIDS.  A comment regarding the high number of 'Comlications' when Plavix was given with a PPI.

-Gardasil has been shown effective in men to prevent infection with high-risk HPV subtypes.  This is great news for some men. -Gardasil when given to all women (now currently in roll-out) will interrupt heterosexual HPV transmission.  Sexually active gay/bisexual males will benefit from Gardasil, but cost-effectiveness is another story.  Gardasil for all females is about...

This phase III study was done without the benefit of conventional drug development with Phase I and Phase II studies (which would have provided more information about the effective dose) preceding it because pharmacokinetic date from IV and SC dosing studies were used to extrapolate for the oral dosing. While in hindsight, this may have not been ideal, the trial holds a lot of promise that...

A novel biomarker developed by Brahms AG could transform the treatment of heart failure patients presenting to the Emergency Department (ED).  This new clinical diagnostic test could pose a challenge to the current marketers of B-type natriuretic peptide (BNP) and N-terminal pro-BNP (NT-proBNP), which have become the diagnostics' gold standard for heart failure testing.

A new University of Toronto study shows that women from breast cancer-prone families who test negative for the BRAC1/BRAC2 genes had a fourfold higher risk of developing breast cancer than average women after 5 years.  Dr. Steven Narod, the study author, said that family history is a stronger predictor than the $3,000 gene test.  The gene test is marketed by Myriad Genetics (NASDAQ:...

It is important to use caution when interperting outcomes (in this case survival) in terms of post-treatment  (Erbitux) variables (rash).  It's a little like saying that patients who respond do better. Yes, it may be true that rash is an early indicator of which patients have a higher likelihood of doing well with Erbitux, but the question is how will that change...

One more hurdle passed by what could be one of the fastest growing therapeutic treatment sectors over the next 20 years.