The roles of the pharmaceutical industry and drug development in dermatology and dermatologic health care.

Pavonis, Inc., Cohasset, Massachusetts, USA. DAltman@Pavonis.com

Drug development is becoming shorter, more high-tech and strategic, more costly, and more complicated. The pharmaceutical, biotech, and cosmetic companies, along with regulatory agencies such as the FDA, are struggling to cope with and master the scientific, medical, and economic implications of this new environment. There are rapidly growing new classes of drugs, including biologicals, genomics, antibodies, and novel receptor-ligand antagonists. Dermatologic drug development has several idiosyncrasies, including the vehicle in topical drugs. Development for dermatology is much cheaper than for other therapeutic areas but also generates much less sales. The pharmaceutical industry's search for blockbusters threatens to leave dermatology without access to these new technologies, therapeutic modalities, and drug classes. The pharmaceutical industry is interested, invested, and intertwined, at many different levels, in the efforts and practices of academic dermatology, dermatology specialty organizations, and clinical dermatologists.

PMID: 10791155 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]