A top official from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said he wants to see something similar to the agency’s Project Orbis program developed for cell and gene therapies, as the involvement of other “high-income countries” could help attract developers, asserted Peter Marks, director of FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER), at the Biopharma Congress on 13 February.   At the meeting, FDA officials offered their perspectives on other policy ar...

Officials from the US Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER) Office of Tissues and Advanced Therapies (OTAT) asserted that the duration of clinical trials for gene therapies depends on the nature of the disease being treated, and that diseases that are more progressive and have a rapid onset may involve shorter trials.   This was one of the learnings imparted by officials during a 7 February virtual town hall meeting to...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced this week it has elevated and reorganized its Office of Tissues and Advanced Therapies (OTAT) to a “Super Office” within the Center of Biologics Research and Evaluation (CBER) to meet its growing workload and new commitments under the Prescription Drug User Fee Act (PDUFA VII) agreement for FY2023-2027.   The office will be renamed the Office of Therapeutic Products (OTP).   “With the current and anticipated incre...

Peter Marks, director of Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER) at the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), attributes an increase in the amount of regenerative medicine advanced therapy (RMAT) requests approved for cell and gene therapies to sponsors “getting the hang” of the agency’s expectations for designation requests.   Marks spoke at the California Separation Science Society’s (CASSS) meeting on 8 June on cell and gene therapies. The meeting was h...

Updated 25 May 2022 to correct ASGCT's name. Wilson Bryan director of the US Food and Drug Administration’s Office of Tissues and Advanced Therapies (OTA) in the agency’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, told a 19 May meeting  of the American Society of Gene and Cell Therapy (ASGCT) that the division is undertaking a series of internal measures to improve communications with sponsors and to widen its messaging.   These measures are being taken to com...

The digital health sector is experiencing enormous growth globally. Briefly, digital health is a branch of healthcare that is primarily focused on improving health using internet, digital, and mobile technologies. One such novel subclass of the digital health ecosystem is digital therapeutics (DTx). DTx are “software-driven,” nonpharmacological therapeutic interventions that can improve the accessibility and effectiveness of healthcare. This article explores the current di...

Industry, medical societies and other stakeholders have weighed in on draft guidance from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) detailing how sponsors that want to study multiple versions of cell and gene therapies could combine them in a single “umbrella” trial.   The draft guidance, released in September 2021, outlined FDA’s proposed thinking for how this process would work. For cell and gene therapies intended to treat a single disease, sponsors would typically ...

A growing workload and insufficient staffing have prompted the US Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Office of Tissues and Advanced Therapies (OTAT) to institute new processes to expedite its reviews of new cell and gene therapies, said OTAT Director Wilson Bryan at a 6 December webinar sponsored by the Alliance for a Stronger FDA.   At the webinar, Bryan was asked to discuss the impact of the projected workload for OTAT, projections for approving new cell and gene t...

Developers of individualized investigational antisense oligonucleotide (ASO) therapies for ultra-rare diseases received additional guidance from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). In two draft documents, the agency has provided new information for sponsor-investigators and for those overseeing manufacture of these so-called “N of 1” therapies for people with severely debilitating or life-threatening genetic disease.   "Progress in individualized medicines provi...

The Asia-Pacific region, which inlcudes Australia, China, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, and South Korea, has a significant number of clinical trials in advanced therapies, with China ranking second globally. Manufacturers in other countries in the region, such as Japan, Australia, South Korea, and Singapore, have submitted marketing authorizations applications for advanced therapies and received approvals. Regulators recognize this emerging trend in dynamic resear...

Two federal agencies are partnering with pharmaceutical companies and non-profit organizations to form a consortium aimed at boosting the development of gene therapies for rare diseases.   In a Wednesday announcement, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) revealed the launch of the Bespoke Gene Therapy Consortium (BGTC). The consortium’s work will be managed by the Foundation for the NIH and sit within the NIH Acceleratin...

  A new draft guidance from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gives cell and gene therapy developers a detailed framework for the conduct of umbrella trials, offering the potential for enhanced speed and efficiency in early-stage clinical trials.   In the umbrella trials envisioned under the draft guidance, two or more versions of a cellular or gene therapy product would be studied for one specific disease using just one trial design, shared infrastructure, a...