OREANDA-NEWS. Cyprotex PLC, a specialist Contract Research Organisation (CRO), announced today the launch of DDI-Fusion, which predicts human drug-drug interactions (DDI) from chemical structure combined with in vitro data.

Drug-drug interactions occur when multiple drugs are administered to a patient and one or more of these drugs have the ability to interact with the metabolism or transport of the co-administered drug(s), leading to changes in plasma concentrations and potentially reduced efficacy (therapeutic effect) or enhanced toxicity. The importance of DDI is growing due to our aging population and the increasing use of polypharmacy with this population and in other conditions such as cancer or HIV.

DDI-Fusion utilises Cyprotex's chemPKTM tool to predict key pharmacokinetic parameters as inputs to the model. It combines these inputs with in vitro data related to DDI mediated via CYP3A4, one of the main drug metabolising enzymes in the body, in order to predict the potential effects on drugs metabolised by this enzyme. The software can also be used to predict interactions with other metabolising enzymes within the body. DDI-Fusion has several advantages over existing techniques in that it uses robust physiologically-based pharmacokinetic (PBPK) modelling techniques and does not require any clinical data as inputs to the model.

Dr Anthony Baxter, Cyprotex's Chief Executive Officer, comments: "DDI-Fusion is the latest addition to a suite of powerful, interconnected in silico tools to assist scientists in decision-making early in the drug discovery process. Prediction of pharmacokinetics by chemPKTM drives the prediction of DDI by DDI-Fusion using a unique algorithm developed here at Cyprotex. The approach is logical, adaptable and robust, and performs favourably compared to the mechanistic static approach currently promoted by the regulatory authorities."