Content by Keyword: Drugs, Medical Devices, and Pharmacy Services

As described above, on any given day there are 250,000 cocaine patients enrolled in treatment, out of an estimated 2 million cocaine addicts in the U.S. If a new medication were used by every current patient in treatment, the medication would have to sell at just over $2.00 per daily dose wholesale ($2.20 to 4.00 per day retail) in order to genera

Since no approved pharmacotherapy for cocaine abuse has been tested on the market, it is not possible to know how sensitive the market would be to such a medication. However, indirect available evidence from other substance abuse medications and the current nature of cocaine abuse treatment and its financing would appear to indicate that the marke

The proportion of the entire population of heavy substance abusers that is considered to be a realistic target market for pharmacotherapy is small relative to the effective target market of pharmacotherapy for other diseases. Although there are other clinical conditions for which the market penetration of pharmacotherapy is proportionately low, th

Substance abuse treatment generally follows a psychosocial, rather than medical, model. The most recent surveys that have examined staffing patterns confirm that the substance abuse treatment system involves little or no physician time in the treatment of patients (Office of Applied Studies, 1993; Brandeis University, 1993). Even when on staff, ph

One of the major questions in developing a new cocaine medication is whether there will be sufficient and reliable payment for the medication. Payment for substance abuse treatment, including for cocaine abuse, remains heavily dependent upon government sources. Government provided almost 80 percent of the financing for substance abuse treatment in

National expenditures for specialized alcohol and drug treatment were about $6.5 billion in 1993, or $19.71 per-patient-per-day for all treatment (Figure 9 below). Approximately $2.6 billion of this amount was spent on outpatient care (i.e., $1.94 billion and $0.65 billion for outpatient-standard and outpatient-intensive care, respectively), or on

The following paragraph provides a summary of some plausible estimates of cocaine use in the United States. The remainder of this section describes the national surveys on drug abuse from which the estimates of cocaine use are derived.

Figure 4: Summary of Estimates of Need for Drug Abuse Treatment in U.S Several studies conducted since 1990 have estimated the need for drug abuse treatment in the U.S. These estimates provide points of reference for the overall magnitude of potential markets for drug abuse medications.  The primary findings of these studies are summari

The market analysis estimates how costs and revenues accrue over time in the development and commercialization of a prospective cocaine medication, and presents plausible scenarios of prospective pharmaceutical companies and their drug development decisionmaking process. For pharmaceutical companies, the risk associated with developing and marketi

Any public policies intended to improve opportunities for developing pharmacotherapies for cocaine addiction must address the three critical barriers described here. It is not within the scope of this study to identify or analyze specific public policies to promote development or marketing of pharmacotherapies for substance abuse.

There was a divergence of opinion among the pharmaceutical company interviewees about the readiness of the science base for cocaine pharmacotherapies. Representatives of two companies expressed skepticism about the readiness of the science base. One representative indicated that current limitations stem from a lack of understanding regarding the b

Industry decision makers recognize the heavy reliance of the substance abuse market on federal, state, and local government reimbursement. The perception among the drug companies is that many cocaine addicts do not have private insurance and rely on federal and state government sources for treatment, and that only a portion of those individuals wi

There are multiple, interrelated aspects of the current substance abuse treatment system that limit the market prospects for any new pharmacotherapy for cocaine addiction. These limitations are apparent in the case studies, were raised by company executives interviewed for this study, and are corroborated by modeling of certain scenarios. Sales of

The small size and uncertainty of the market for cocaine pharmacotherapies constitutes a critical barrier to development of a cocaine abuse pharmacotherapy. Although all of the company executives interviewed for this study agreed that the total number of cocaine users is appreciable, they recognized that the feasible market for a cocaine abuse tre

Many of the market barriers identified in the 1995 IOM report were confirmed through the sources used for this study. Although no new general types of new market barriers were identified in this study, certain ones were elaborated or described in a more contemporary context.

The purpose of the case studies is to gain insight into the experiences of companies that are relevant to developing and marketing medications for drug abuse and addiction. These include two in-depth case studies of LAAM for heroin addiction and naltrexone for heroin addiction (as Trexan) and alcohol addiction (as ReVia), as well as two smaller ca

This report presents several scenarios of pharmaceutical company decision making regarding whether to undertake projects to develop pharmacotherapies for cocaine addiction under various sets of market conditions. Using a quantitative model developed by The Lewin Group, the market conditions were translated into financial and other parameters to ge

Pharmaceutical companies' decisions to pursue new products are based largely on financial considerations inherent in risk-reward tradeoffs. Despite their diversity, most market barriers can be interpreted as having a direct effect on one or more financial parameters that are factored into these decisions. Similarly, most policy options that exist

Pharmaceutical companies' decisions to pursue new products are based largely on financial considerations inherent in risk-reward tradeoffs. Financial indicators such as product net present value (NPV) and peak annual revenue (PAR) usually drive investment decisions. Beyond the appreciable risk associated with developing and marketing any new medic

The proportion of the entire population of heavy substance abusers that is considered to be a realistic target market for pharmacotherapy is small relative to the target market of medications for other diseases. Although there are other clinical conditions for which the market penetration of medications is proportionately low, the absolute magnitu