Need for further drug research for retinoblastoma

The rising number of children under four years is creating more cases of retinoblastoma, a rare cancerous tumor of the retina in children, producing a gap in the market for further drug developments despite the effectiveness of current treatments, a new study by health care analysis specialist GlobalData has found.

While the new research found that young patients suffering from retinoblastoma are well catered for in terms of drugs and effective therapeutics, it also recognized that the value of the global retinoblastoma therapeutics market is expected to increase from $1.7 million to $2.1 million over the next eight years, providing opportunities for pharmaceutical companies to increase their research investment.

The market is currently dominated by a mixture of off-label and generic drugs such as vincristine, etoposide and carboplatin (VEC regimen). These drugs offer a high cure rate with high safety and efficacy for patients. As the drugs used to treat the disease already have a good level of success, the market has remained largely closed to new entrants.