February 09, 2012

SALES OF ANTICOAGULANTS FOR THE TREATMENT OF ST-ELEVATION MYOCARDIAL INFARCTION WILL DOUBLE OVER THE NEXT 10 YEARS

WALTHAM, Mass., Sept. 22 /PRNewswire/ -- Decision Resources, one of the world's leading research and advisory firms for pharmaceutical and healthcare issues, finds that, as a result of new anticoagulants that show improved efficacy over unfractionated heparin in the treatment of ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI), anticoagulant sales will double over the next decade, growing from $56.7 million in 2007 to more than $114 million in 2017.

The new Pharmacor report entitled ST-Elevation Myocardial Infarction finds that, by 2017, patient share of The Medicine Company's Angiomax/Angiox will increase approximately 16 percent and patient share of GlaxoSmithKline's Arixtra will increase more than nine percent in the United States, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom and Japan. Although Arixtra's patient share will grow, its potential will be limited because the agent is associated with an increased incidence of catheter thrombosis, according to the report.

The report also finds that percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) has become more widely available to STEMI patients, owing to improvements in the reduction of time it takes for a patient to receive successful insertion of an angioplasty balloon following their arrival at a hospital (commonly known as "door-to-balloon" time). However, many hospitals-especially in rural areas-remain without the facilities or trained staff necessary to perform PCI and improvements are still needed to establish the rapid, integrated transport of STEMI patients to PCI-equipped hospitals.

"The combination of improved mortality and lower bleeding rates with Angiomax/Angiox compared with standard therapy of unfractionated heparin and a glycoprotein IIb/IIIa inhibitor for STEMI patients undergoing PCI has generated strong interest among interviewed experts, particularly in the United States," said Jeremy Goldman, M.D., analyst at Decision Resources. "The improvement in mortality observed with Arixtra compared with unfractionated heparin in patients receiving thrombolysis has not generated the same level of interest because of the increased incidence of catheter thrombosis in patients undergoing rescue PCI and because the use of thrombolysis is declining."

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SOURCE Decision Resources