title: Discontinued drugs in 2012: cardiovascular drugs.
abstract: The continued high rate of cardiovascular morbidity and mortality has attracted wide concern and great attention of pharmaceutical industry. In order to reduce the attrition of cardiovascular drug R&D, it might be helpful recapitulating previous failures and identifying the potential factors to success. This perspective mainly analyses the 30 cardiovascular drugs dropped from clinical development in 2012. Reasons causing the termination of the cardiovascular drugs in the past 5 years are also tabulated and analysed. The analysis shows that the attrition is highest in Phase II trials and financial and strategic factors and lack of clinical efficacy are the principal reasons for these disappointments. To solve the four problems (The 'better than the Beatles' problem, the 'cautious regulator' problem, the 'throw money at it' tendency and the 'basic researchbrute force' bias) is recommended as the main measure to increase the number and quality of approvable products.
authors.affiliation: China Pharmaceutical University, Ministry of Education, Center for Instrumental Analysis, Key Laboratory of Drug Quality Control & Pharmacovigilance , Nanjing, Jiangsu 210009 , China +86 25 8327 1180 ; +86 25 8327 1335 ; hpzhaojstar@126.com.
authors.forename: Hong-Ping
authors.initials: HP
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.forename: Hong-Min
authors.initials: HM
authors.lastname: Jiang
authors.forename: Bing-Ren
authors.initials: BR
authors.lastname: Xiang
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002317:Cardiovascular Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use; D002318:Cardiovascular Diseases / Q000188:drug therapy; D002986:Clinical Trials as Topic; D055808:Drug Discovery / Q000639:trends; D015507:Drugs, Investigational / Q000627:therapeutic use; D006801:Humans
chemical_list: D002317:Cardiovascular Agents; D015507:Drugs, Investigational