DecisionBase PDFs

March 2009

Parkinson’s Disease: A Transdermal Formulation of Levodopa Would Tap into a Significant Opportunity in This Mature Market

Introduction:

The Parkinson’s disease (PD) therapy market is a mature market characterized by significant unmet need and a large and diverse pipeline. Levodopa has long played a key role in PD treatment, but despite its initial efficacy in treating PD, it eventually induces motor response complications (MRCs) in patients. To delay the use of levodopa and thus the development of MRCs, physicians prescribe other dopaminergic therapies, most notably dopamine agonists, which currently dominate the PD market. Although reformulations of key dopamine agonists will offer improved drug delivery, drugs are still needed to effectively manage the motor and nonmotor complications associated with levodopa and, most importantly, to slow or reverse the progression of PD.

Questions Answered in This Report:

  *   Effect on global symptoms, effect on motor symptoms, and effect on activities of daily living and/or quality of life are key measures of efficacy in PD treatment. How do neurologists weight specific efficacy end points and other drug attributes in their prescribing decisions for PD?

  *   Pramipexole immediate-release (IR) (Boehringer Ingelheim’s Mirapex/Mirapexin/Sifrol) is the 2007 major-market sales leader for PD. How will pramipexole IR and other current therapies fare against emerging therapies? Will emerging therapies offer improvements in the efficacy end points and drug attributes that are most influential in physician prescribing decisions? If so, which current therapies will suffer the most from the entry of these new agents?

  *   Based on its clinical profile, the entacapone-levodopa-carbidopa fixed-dose combination drug (Novartis/Orion Pharma’s Stalevo) is the 2007 clinical gold standard in our Drug Comparator Model. What attributes do thought leaders believe differentiate this drug from competing current and emerging therapies? Will any drugs in development challenge Stalevo as the future gold standard in 2012 or 2017?

Scope:

Key drug development opportunity tested in our Target Product Profiles for PD: a once-daily transdermal formulation of levodopa-carbidopa.

Physicians surveyed for this study: 62 U.S. and 30 European neurologists.

Comprehensive List of Therapies Included in Our Research and Modeling

Current therapies:

- Pramipexole IR (Boehringer Ingelheim’s Mirapex/Mirapexin/Sifrol).

- Ropinirole CR (GlaxoSmithKline/SkyePharma’s Requip XL/CR/LP/RP/Modutab).

- Entacapone-levodopa-carbidopa (Novartis/Orion Pharma’s Stalevo).

- Rasagiline (Teva/Lundbeck’s Agilect/Azilect).

- Rotigotine (UCB/Schwarz Pharma’s Neupro)

Emerging therapies:

- Pramipexole ER (Boehringer Ingelheim).

- Safinamide (Newron Pharmaceuticals/Merck Serono).

- Pardoprunox (Solvay Pharmaceuticals).

- Pimavanserin (Acadia Pharmaceuticals).

- Fipamezole (Juvantia Pharma/Santhera Pharmaceuticals).

About DecisionBase

Parkinson’s Disease: A Transdermal Formulation of Levodopa Would Tap into a Significant Opportunity in This Mature Market is a DecisionBase 2009 study from Decision Resources. DecisionBase 2009 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 2009 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.

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