The international life sciences year started off with J.P. Morgan’s Annual Healthcare week, which drew thousands of life science experts to San Francisco earlier this month.
Out of the many partnering meetings and vibrant panel discussions on current trends and challenges in the field, Marjo Puumalainen, Program Director of NLSDays and International Director at SwedenBIO, pin-pointed three highlights of particular interest.
- Digital therapeutics is a growing class of therapeutics that is actively being prescribed by the clinicians. Successful clinical trials have led into FDA-approvals of digital therapeutics to treat conditions like chronic insomnia, ADHD and abuse disorders. The next challenges for digital therapeutics to overcome are reimbursement models and insurance policies – yet the field of digital therapeutics is expected to grow significantly in the upcoming years.
- Many actors are worried about the costs of gene and cell therapies, as more of them are getting approval for a number of diseases. The cost of a single treatment of these types of therapies is high. However, if the treatment can cure the patient for life, the cost of treatment is easier to justify. The total cost of gene and cell therapies boils down to the durability of the treatment – how long the patient stay healthy with one treatment. More data is needed on durability of gene and cell therapies, such as the first FDA-approved haemophilia B gene therapy developed by CSL Behring, which costs 3.5M USD per treatment.
- The challenging financial climate is forcing companies to rethink their business models and R&D processes – it’s all about more bang for your buck in 2023. Many companies are exploring opportunities to share R&D and manufacturing facilities – and even employees – with several corporates to reduce running costs. R&D companies are looking into new income sources such as offering services or licencing parts of their platforms along with their internal R&D projects.
These trends and many other topics are currently under consideration as themes for the super sessions at NLSDays 2023.
