US-based inhaled medicines provider Genoa Pharmaceuticals in collaboration with McMaster University has demonstrated advantages of the inhaled aerosol pirfenidone (GP-101) in the treatment of pulmonary fibrosis.
The findings showed that small inhaled doses yielding high peak, short duration lung pirfenidone concentrations provide statistically greater anti-fibrotic efficacy than higher oral doses resulting in low peak drug exposure by using the in vivo model of bleomycin-induced pulmonary fibrosis.
Genoa Pharmaceuticals founder, president and chief scientific officer Mark Surber said for IPF treatment to be successful, sufficient drug must first be delivered to the lung.
"Although the oral dose size is large, because swallowed pirfenidone spreads throughout the body before reaching the lung the resulting delivered lung dose is quite small," Surber added.
"As inhalation delivery administers pirfenidone directly to the lung, a significant increase is achieved with only a very small inhaled dose."
The oral medicine was also observed to reduce or eliminate gastrointestinal and systemic side effects due to the small inhaled doses mostly avoiding the gastrointestinal tract.
"By this route of administration, it is further anticipated that patient compliance will also improve," Surber said.
McMaster University Medicine Pathology & Molecular Medicine Department Respirology Division Associate Professor Martin Kolb said that the university observed stronger anti-fibrotic effects than with oral pirfenidone, notably at an equivalent tissue level, suggesting the compound reaches important tissue compartments better if administered by inhalation.
"This result certainly warrants further clinical evaluation of inhaled GP-101 in IPF patients," Kolb added.
