Society for Anti-infective Pharmacology--Ninth International Symposium. 3-4 July 1999, Birmingham, UK.
This meeting, organized as a 'self-contained' pre-symposium to the 21st International Congress of Chemotherapy, was introduced by Paul Tulkens (Université Catholique de Louvain, Brussels, Belgium), the outgoing president of the society, who reviewed the progress of pharmacodynamics (PD) and pharmacokinetics (PK) in anti-infective research over the past ten years. It was noted that, hitherto, the factors driving therapeutic regimens have been largely 'irrational' with a concentration on achieving the lowest dosage, PK being used principally to establish drug presence and PD considerations largely 'terra incognita'. In contrast, through recent PK/PD studies, we now know that the dose effect of different classes of anti-infectives varies widely, with some showing time-dependence, some a post-antibiotic effect and some co-operating with host defenses. By integrating these factors, we should be in a better position to predict the success or failure of potential new antibiotics at an earlier stage. The focus of the meeting was, therefore, the use of PD and PK to accelerate drug discovery, development and registration. Two particular factors were stressed: the need to establish dosing regimens which avoided or minimized the development of resistance and the role of PD/PK in the discovery process for novel classes of antibiotics that are emerging from genomic programs. The conference was attended by approximately 50 participants, from academia and industry, with representatives from several regulatory authorities also present.
Witty
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Department of Medicinal Chemistry, SmithKline Beecham Pharmaceuticals, Coldharbour Road, Essex CM19 5AW, United Kingdom. David_Witty-1@sbphrd.com.