How value-added medicines bring innovation to the pharma industry
As the healthcare landscape continually evolves, value-added medicines are transforming patient care by taking medicines that already exist and creating innovative solutions that address patient needs. These innovations often lead to better patient outcomes and more convenient treatment options.
These solutions are due to the wide spectrum of technologies incorporated by value-added medicines, ranging from continuous innovations to breakthrough innovations.1 Continuous innovations describe value-added medicines that have been created through, for example, reformulating existing medicines.1 Breakthrough innovations describe value-added medicines created through combining medicines with medical devices (e.g. changing the route of administration through the use of improved inhalers and autoinjectors).1
Value-added medicines bring innovation by prioritising the patient experience and practicality – this means that effective treatment options can reach wider patient populations.
Value-added medicines also focus on addressing unmet needs with existing medicines rather than creating brand-new drugs or copies of existing medicines. They offer additional clinical or non-clinical benefits to their reference products.2 They are innovating healthcare systems in various ways:3
- Increasing patient access to treatments
- Cost savings to healthcare systems
- Enhancing patient outcomes
The power of digital health and new drug-delivery systems
Value-added medicines can help optimise existing treatments through changes to dosage/formulation, repositioning of indications (using the medicine for a different indication versus its original licence), or via combination with other medicines, different drug-delivery systems, or new digital health technology.3
Drug-delivery systems are the technologies that carry drugs into or throughout the body – this could be a pill, liquid, transdermal patch, via inhalation, or other methods.4 They can also describe how the drug is packaged to minimise the level of its degradation in the body before it reaches its target.4
Some value-added medicines combine already existing drugs into new inhaler designs for asthma care, for example. With the aim to make the inhaler easier for patients to use, these innovative devices support consistent dose delivery and feature a dose indicator.3
Some diabetes management systems combine insulin pumps with continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) technology.5 They improve the time spent in the target glucose range as they continuously track blood glucose levels through a CGM device, offering benefits like improved blood glucose control, ease of use, and personalised treatment.5
Some medicines can only be delivered systemically. However, some can be administered locally to minimise adverse effects and toxicity while maintaining efficacy, and some are delivered through innovative methods. For example, liposomes can be used to carry an existing medicine through the body, protecting the medicine from degradation and controlling its release.3,6
Colonis is driving innovation with value-added medicines
At Colonis Pharma Ltd, we are committed to prioritising the development of value-added medicines to deliver treatment options that empower patients’ lives. Through our innovative solutions, we create value-added medicines to improve the clinical outcomes and quality of life of patients.
Colonis is enhancing medicines by exploring new indications for existing medicines (i.e., repositioning) and reformulating medicines. Reformulation of currently existing medicines can improve the delivery method, bringing innovative solutions for patients, for example, converting an injectable medicine into an oral form or even converting a tablet medicine into a liquid form. Such reformulations can improve convenience for patients and, in turn, adherence.7
References
- Arias A. A Digital Future for Value Added Medicines. Available from: https://www.medicinesforeurope.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/20190924_IQVIAa-digital-future-for-value-added-medicines.pdf [Accessed November 2024].
- Kim H et al. MAbs. 2021;13:1868078.
- Toumi M and Rémuzat C. J Mark Access Health Policy. 2017;5:1264717.
- National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering. Drug delivery systems. Available from: https://www.nibib.nih.gov/science-education/science-topics/drug-delivery-systems-getting-drugs-their-targets-controlled-manner [Accessed November 2024].
- Reddy N et al. Monitoring Technologies – Continuous Glucose Monitoring, Mobile Technology, Biomarkers of Glycemic Control. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK279046/ [Accessed November 2024].
- Liu P et al. Molecules. 2022;27:1372.
- Gupta R et al. JAMA Health Forum. 2022;3:e221096.
Colonis Pharma Ltd is an independent entity under the Clinigen Group.
November 2024 | GB-CPL-0-185
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