CNS drugs development takes longer than other drugs, says Tufts CSDD

Drugs that treat central nervous system (CNS) diseases take more than a year longer to develop and are less than half as likely to obtain marketing approval as other drugs, according to a newly-completed study by the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development.

Mean clinical development time for CNS drugs approved for marketing in the USA from 1999 through 2013 was 12.8 months, or 18%, longer than for non-CNS compounds, according to Tufts CSDD.

In addition, the overall clinical approval success rate (share of compounds entering clinical testing that obtain marketing approval) for CNS compounds first tested in human subjects from 1995 to 2007 (and followed through 2013) was 6.2%, or less than half the 13.3% rate for non-CNS drugs.