Personalized drugs on the rise in 2015

The number of personalized drugs approved by the FDA were on the rise in 2015
The number of personalized drugs approved by the FDA were on the rise in 2015 | shutterstock.com
The Personalized Medicine Coalition (PMC) has discovered through analysis of its data that personalized drugs were on the rise in 2015.

 According to the PMC’s documents, one in four novel new drugs (NNDs) approved by the FDA last year were personalized medicines.

The "2015 Progress Report: Personalized Medicine at FDA" analysis revealed that NNDs accepted in 2015 were classified as 13 personalized medicines. This made up 28 percent of the NNDs approved overall. There were 45 total last year. This continued the trend from 2014, when 21 percent of the NNDs approved were personalized medicines. The increase in the number of personalized medicines over the last two years is the result of their capacity to improve patients’ recovery.

Another reason for the rise of personalized medicines is their success in treating a vast amount of diseases, including rare genetic disorders. This gives medical professionals more treatment options to combat these diseases and disorders. The data released in 2015 by the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development has shown that 42 percent of all the drugs currently in development are personalized medicines. This has medical professionals believing that this is not just a fleeting trend, but the future of drug development.