Growing Uptake of Genzyme's Aubagio at Three Months Post-Launch Is Likely Driven by Perceived Product Convenience Even As Neurologists Search to Identify Appropriate Candidates, According to a Recent BioTrends Report

EXTON, Penn., March 6, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- BioTrends Research Group, one of the world's leading research and advisory firms for specialized biopharmaceutical issues, finds that 34 percent of surveyed U.S. neurologists have prescribed Genzyme's Aubagio to at least one of their multiple sclerosis (MS) patients at three months post-launch, a significant increase in trial rate from one month post-launch (16 percent). Data from the recently published LaunchTrends^®: Aubagio Wave 2 report suggest that expanding Aubagio trial is driven in part by positive perceptions related to the product's convenient once-daily, oral administration. Aubagio, the second oral disease-modifying agent (DMA) to reach the MS market, is the DMA most associated with favorable route of administration/formulation by half of neurologists. Despite the growth in Aubagio prescriber base, Aubagio's current DMA-treated relapsing remitting MS (RRMS) share and average patient volume per prescriber remain low, likely owing to neurologists' continued search to identify appropriate Aubagio candidates, as well as lingering concerns related to hepatotoxicity and teratogenicity. Nevertheless, adoption within individual practices is largely on par with that seen for Novartis's Gilenya, the first oral DMA to reach the MS market, three months after Gilenya's commercial availability*.

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Over the next six months, surveyed neurologists anticipate that Aubagio's DMA-treated RRMS share will increase significantly to over 6 percent, pulling share from Biogen Idec's Avonex, Bayer HealthCare's Betaseron, Teva's Copaxone and Pfizer/EMD Serono's Rebif. In fact, of the two-thirds of neurologists who have never prescribed Aubagio, 69 percent anticipate a trial within the next six months, suggesting Aubagio prescriber base will grow to approximately 80 percent of neurologists by nine months post-launch. High product satisfaction among current prescribers, as well as continued messaging and physician and patient education, will likely contribute to future growth.      

LaunchTrends: Aubagio is a four-wave syndicated report series that specifically tracks the introduction of Aubagio into the market, based on data collected at one month, three months, six months and one year post-commercial availability of Aubagio from primary research with neurologists. The second wave was fielded January 11-14, 2013 with 73 U.S. neurologists followed by qualitative interviews with a subset of 15 survey respondents. Along with awareness and sources of familiarity, the reports assess neurologists' trial, adoption and usage, including anticipated future trends, of Aubagio within the MS market. The reports also provide information on product perceptions, satisfaction, obstacles to use, drivers of prescribing, patient types, displacement of competitors, Genzyme's promotional efforts and benchmarking against other previously launched MS agents.

In addition to the LaunchTrends: Aubagio report series, BioTrends will track the U. S. uptake of Aubagio in the biannual TreatmentTrends^®: Multiple Sclerosis (US) report series. This syndicated primary research report series provides a view of the broader MS market landscape, including all currently approved DMAs and DMAs in late-stage clinical development.

*Source: LaunchTrends: Gilenya Wave 2, BioTrends Research Group, published February 11, 2011

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SOURCE BioTrends Research Group