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Pharmaceutical companies have immense social responsibility upon them. They are more than just industrial businesses that think about production and profit. Pharmaceutical companies need to be constantly on their toes to meet the demands of patients suffering from new kinds of ailments every day!
But is new drug development the only way to meet the demands of medicine? Not exclusively! Drug reformulation can help pharmaceutical companies drive medical innovation too.
The truth is that new drug development is not only excessively time consuming but also very costly. A recent study estimated that the average cost of developing a drug and bringing it to the market is around 1.3 billion dollars! This, and the number of tests conducted on the drug to deem it fit for consumption, takes additional years that becomes a bottleneck in the medical innovation process.
As a result, drug reformulation has become the mainstream strategy in drug development to drive medical innovation. In drug reformulation, pharmaceutical companies develop different formulations for the same drug and study their effects on various ailments.
Experts suggest that drug reformulation can be an essential method to extend the life cycle of patented drugs. It has been observed in many cases that a drug that was initially very popular and has now gradually lost efficiency or a drug that was never really popular has been able to prove its efficiency with reformulations. Drug reformulation improves therapeutic efficacy and drug compliance and can elevate the clinical outcomes of the same drug.
One of the most significant benefits of drug reformulation is that it gives pharmaceutical companies a head start in drug development. When pharmaceutical companies reformulate a drug, they do not have to develop it from scratch. They already have a formula that is tried, tested, and approved by the FDA; reformulating it is much easier than starting from nothing. It also makes it easier for the patients to comply with it and adhere to the new kind of reformulated drug.
Speaking from the business point of view, drug reformulation plays a significant role in extending the commercial life cycle of the product. First, if a drug is sinking in the market due to rival competition, a reformulated drug can give them an edge over the rivals. Secondly, once a drug starts circulating in the market, everybody knows its impact, and it becomes straightforward to replicate its effects.
But once the drug is reformulated through proprietary formulation technologies, it becomes tough for prospective generic rivals to replicate the drug, which adds to the pharmaceutical company's authenticity and credibility.
Thus, drug reformulation can have a significant impact on all the parties involved- whether they produce, distribute, or consume the drug. There are a lot of reformulation strategies adopted by the pharmaceutical companies.
1. Changing the route of administration of the drug- A lot of drugs are reformulated to have the routes of administration changed, which can make the administration of drugs easier and more convenient for the patient. In many cases, the changed route of administration also helps combat some side effects that may have accompanied the previous method of drug intake. For example, a drug administered orally may change to administration by inhalation.
2. Reducing dosage frequency of the drug- Many pharmaceutical companies are working on reducing the frequency of consumption of the drug. This can either be done by making the drug so effective that one may not need to take it very frequently, or specific polymers are administered that stay in the body and slowly release the drug into the bloodstream in limited amounts. This is an excellent way to reduce the dosage frequency and control the number of drugs entering the bloodstream.
3. Targeting the patient profiles- Drug reformulation is essentially very beneficial for patients who may have trouble consuming the administered drug. For example, suppose a patient finds it difficult to swallow large tablets due to an oesophageal condition or lack of experience. In that case, drug reformulation can offer an alternate mode of drug administration and ensure that the drug is administered without any problem.
Drug reformulation is an excellent way to meet those needs of the medical industry that need urgent and full proof attention. It can drive innovation in the medical industry with minimal cost and little experimentation.
ZIM Labs is an innovative drug delivery solution provider focusing on improving patient convenience and adherence to drug intake. We offer a range of technology-based drug delivery solutions and non-infringing proprietary manufacturing processes for the production and supply of innovative and differentiated generic pharmaceutical products to our customers globally. At ZIM Labs we provide our customers a comprehensive range of value-added solid dosage differentiated generic products in semi-finished and finished categories/formulations. These include granules, pellets (immediate, sustained, modified and extended-release), taste-masked powders, suspensions, tablets, capsules, and recently developed Oral Thin Films (OTF).
