Covance, Frenova Partner On Kidney, Renal Disease Treatments
By Cyndi Root
Covance and Frenova Renal Research have established a new research collaboration to find treatments for patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD) and end stage renal disease (ESRD). The partnership, announced in a press release, utilizes Frenova’s database of patients and Covance’s analytics. Marc Ginsky, VP at Covance, said, “With this unique combination of data and analytics, we can look at how patients actually use medicines day-to-day, which includes the reality of less-than-perfect adherence. We can then explore real-world safety and effectiveness, comparing therapies head-to-head and in the full range of patients.”
Covance and Frenova Collaboration
The goal of the collaboration between Covance and Frenova is to find the most effective treatments for CKD and ESRD patients. Frenova’s database contains longitudinal data on 393,000 CKD patients and 980,000 ESRD patients. Using Covance’s analytics, the two companies will gather insights on how the illness affects patients, the types of treatments used, safety, efficacy, and medication adherence. With comprehensive data, the insights will be used to inform future studies, including feasibility, study sites, recruitment, and sample sizes.
Covance states that it expects the initiative to benefit dialysis patients in particular, as they undergo intensive treatment and live only five years after diagnosis. The company hopes that the collaboration will provide insight into slowing CKD progression and help patients avoid dialysis altogether. The analysis will take into account “real-world” medication adherence, which is often less than perfect.
CKD and ESRD Market
Decision Resources released a report in January 2014 on the chronic kidney disease market. Analysts expect the market to contract through 2017 due to competition from generics and insurance reimbursement constraints in the U.S. However, the report states that the market will rebound and see growth through 2022. Medications seeing the most activity are active vitamin D analogues, calcium mimetics, erythropoietin-stimulating agents (ESAs), phosphate binders, and antihypertensive agents.
Analysts find that novel drugs will drive the most market growth, especially hypoxia-inducible factor-prolyl hydroxylase (HIF-PH) inhibitors. FibroGen, AstraZeneca, and Astella’s HIF-PH inhibitors are expected to lead the field. Other drugs in the pipeline include AbbVie’s atrasentan for diabetic nephropathy and Amgen’s velcalcetide for CKD patients with secondary hyperparathryoidism.