title: Discontinued drugs in 2005: schizophrenia drugs.
abstract: This paper is the third in a series discussing drugs dropped from development in 2005. Schizophrenia is particularly interesting with regard to pipeline discontinuation, and appears to be unique in this data set because the number of discontinuations far exceeds that for other neuropsychiatric conditions. If this is taken as a proxy for overall drug discovery activity, it represents a very large amount of activity across a wide range of big pharmaceutical corporations. It is also clear that many of the discontinued drugs have mechanisms of action that would make them theoretically suitable as treatments for schizophrenia. Why should so much activity be directed towards what many may consider an undeserving, relatively untreatable and relatively non-rehabilitatable group of patients? This is debated in this opinion piece.
authors.affiliation: Clinical Neuropharmacology, Institute of Psychiatry, London, UK. r.kerwin@iop.kcl.ac.uk
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Kerwin
mesh_terms: D014150:Antipsychotic Agents / Q000494:pharmacology; D004298:Dopamine / Q000502:physiology; D018491:Dopamine Agonists / Q000494:pharmacology; D018492:Dopamine Antagonists / Q000494:pharmacology; D065127:Dopamine D2 Receptor Antagonists; D017277:Drug Approval; D015195:Drug Design; D015507:Drugs, Investigational / Q000494:pharmacology; D006801:Humans; D008960:Models, Psychological; D017981:Receptors, Neurotransmitter / Q000187:drug effects; D011985:Receptors, Serotonin / Q000187:drug effects; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000188:drug therapy*; D012702:Serotonin Antagonists / Q000494:pharmacology
chemical_list: D014150:Antipsychotic Agents; D018491:Dopamine Agonists; D018492:Dopamine Antagonists; D065127:Dopamine D2 Receptor Antagonists; D015507:Drugs, Investigational; D017981:Receptors, Neurotransmitter; D011985:Receptors, Serotonin; D012702:Serotonin Antagonists; D004298:Dopamine