"This exciting new gene discovery could provide the vital information necessary to create a completely new drug to treat this extremely common disease. In addition, this new set of gene biomarkers, discovered by Health Discovery Corporation, could provide a diagnostic test used to evaluate patients undergoing treatment for BPH."
Dr. Herbert Fritsche
Professor and Chief of Clinical Chemistry
M.D. Anderson Cancer Center
Health Discovery Corporation has identified and patent protected a subset of genes that separates Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia (BPH) from prostate cancer with a high degree of accuracy. This same set of genes also separates BPH from normal tissue, indicating that BPH is a disease with molecular characteristics of its own. This discovery could be used to develop a new, non-invasive molecular diagnostic test for BPH which does not currently exist, as well as suggest acompletely new type of therapy for patients with this disease. This newly discovered gene signature could be used as a surrogate biomarker to significantly reduce both costs and time in a pharmaceutical clinical trial for a new BPH drug and could cut years off the clinical trial, saving hundreds of millions of dollars in clinical trial costs.
Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia (BPH) is the enlargement of the prostate gland that occurs as men age and affects thirty-three million men worldwide. BPH occurs in approximately 25% of men over the age of 40, gradually increasing until it affects 90% of men over the age of 85. Of the 9 million diagnosed cases of BPH in the United States, 2 million receive drug therapy treatment while an additional 7 million men are awaiting for new treatments. BPH is a common condition, representing a $3 billion annual market in the United States alone.
