The book “Nuevos usos para viejos medicamentos” has been published within the collection “Qué sabemos de”

On September 13, the book " Nuevos usos para viejos medicamentos" is put on sale as part of the collection "Qué sabemos de" published by the CSIC and Los Libros de la Catarata. The text has been written by the researchers of the Margarita Salas Center for Biological Research Nuria E. Campillo, Carmen Fernández and Mercedes Jiménez.

Having a drug on the market to treat a disease is a long process that requires multiple stages and several years from the moment the initial prototypes are developed and evolved to become a drug that we can buy in the pharmacy. It is also an expensive process, the average cost to research and develop each drug successfully is estimated to be around €1000 million. Furthermore, the probability that a drug will successfully pass all required steps is less than 12%.

These complications have forced in recent years the development of new strategies to reduce the time periods and costs of the process. The most prominent among these are repositioning, which seeks to give a new therapeutic use to an already existing drug, and reformulation, which develops new formulations for a specific drug.

The book describes both strategies and presents not only their success stories but also their drawbacks. In addition, its applications are analyzed in areas of great importance such as the search for treatments for rare diseases, pandemics caused by emerging viruses, and the development of antibiotics.

The editorial line "Qué sabemos de" brings key scientific research topics to a broad audience through short and accessible texts prepared by CSIC scientists and is the result of an agreement between the CSIC and the Publishing House Los Libros de la Catarata.

More information:

Los Libros de la Catarata Publishing House: enlace.

CSIC Press Release: link.