Perfused human organs versus Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.
Novel drugs have to go through mandatory pre-clinical testing before they can be approved for use in clinical trials. In essence, it is a form of bench-to-bedside (N2B) translational medicine, but the wastage rate of target candidates is immensely high. Effects seen in vitro often do not translate to in vivo human settings. The search is on for better models closer to human physiology to be used in pre-clinical drug screening. The Ex Vivo Metrics system has been introduced where a human organ is harvested and revitalized in a controlled environment suitable for testing of both drug efficacy and potential toxicity. This commentary expresses the author's views regarding this technology of perfused human organs.
Leung
Lawrence
L
Department of Family Medicine, Queen's University, 220 Bagot Street, Kingston, Ontario, Canada. leungl@queensu.ca
D000818:Animals; D035843:Biomedical Research; D015510:Clinical Medicine; D004353:Drug Evaluation, Preclinical / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D066298:In Vitro Techniques; D010477:Perfusion