Current And Emerging Drugs Have No Advantage Over Enbrel In Inhibiting/Slowing The Progression Of Rheumatoid Arthritis

Decision Resources, one
of the world's leading research and advisory firms focusing on
pharmaceutical and healthcare issues, finds that a drug's effect on
inhibiting/slowing the progression of structural damage and reducing the
signs and symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis during the first year of
treatment are the attributes that most influence surveyed rheumatologists'
prescribing decisions in the treatment of the disease. Clinical data and
expert opinion shows that current and emerging therapies have no advantage
in these attributes over the market sales leader, Amgen/Wyeth/Takeda's
Enbrel.


The new report entitled Rheumatoid Arthritis: Competitive, Crowded
Market Sets the Bar High for Novel Agents finds that, through 2016, there
are no therapies in development that will displace Enbrel as the clinical
gold standard treatment for rheumatoid arthritis. While some therapies in
development for the disease hold promise, most have efficacy, safety and
tolerability, and/or delivery features that are inferior when compared with
Enbrel.



The overall efficacy of emerging therapies such as
Centocor/Schering-Plough/Mitsubishi Tanabe/Janssen's golimumab and Biogen
Idec/Genentech/Roche's ocrelizumab is comparable to that of Enbrel, while
the overall safety and tolerability for emerging therapies that include
ocrelizumab and UCB's Cimzia are also comparable to that of Enbrel.
However, the currently available clinical data for golimumab, ocrelizumab
and Cimzia is not as robust or extensive as those available for Enbrel.



"While emerging therapies such as golimumab and Cimzia offer superior
delivery to that of Enbrel due to improved dosing frequencies, these
agents' overall efficacy, safety and tolerability, respectively, are
inferior to those of Enbrel-and efficacy, safety and tolerability are
weighted more heavily by surveyed rheumatologists as key drivers of
prescribing decisions," said Cindy Mundy, Ph.D., director at Decision
Resources. "As a result, the improvements in dosing frequency that
golimumab and Cimzia offer over Enbrel are not sufficient to propel either
agent to the position of future gold standard."



About the Report



Rheumatoid Arthritis: Competitive, Crowded Market Sets the Bar High for
Novel Agents is a DecisionBase 2008 report from Decision Resources.
DecisionBase 2008 combines market forecasts with clinical and commercial
end points to assess market share projections in 35 indications. These
outputs are driven by quantitative and qualitative primary research.
DecisionBase 2008 provides detailed market share, patient share, and
price-per-day projections for emerging drugs in development. The market
share projections are based on prescriber surveys that compare physicians'
expectations of a potential target product profile with an emerging product
profile of the leading drugs in development.



The report can be purchased by contacting Decision Resources. Members
of the media may request an interview with an analyst.



About Decision Resources



Decision Resources, Inc. (decisionresources) is a world
leader in market research publications, advisory services, and consulting
designed to help clients shape strategy, allocate resources, and master
their chosen markets. Decision Resources is a Decision Resources, Inc.
company.



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View drug information on Cimzia; Enbrel.