NEWS: Our Blog

Australia Advantage – Consider Conducting Clinical Trials in Australia

Mar 16, 2023 11:33:42 AM / by Alliance Pharma posted in Pharmaceuticals, Immunoassay, bioanalytical, laboratory, Quality, Large Molecule, Bioanalysis, DMPK, Australia

australia_advantage_header_png

Our advanced scientific infrastructure and world-class experts attract trials from across the globe and meet their needs with the highest standards and efficient regulatory requirements.

Explore the extensive benefits of Australia’s clinical research ecosystem below.

  1. GLOBALLY ACCEPTED DATA
    Alliance Pharma has a world-class reputation for quality data, following the highest level of GCP and ICH standards. Data from clinical trials conducted in Australia is widely accepted by all regulatory authorities including FDA and EMA.

  2. EXTEND YOUR BUDGET BY 43.5%
     includes bioanalytics services
     almost halve your clinical trial costs

    You can claim R&D cash refund with the Australian Government clinical trial rebate program. As an example, if you spend $200k on eligible R&D, you can receive $87k (43.5%) back from the Australian Tax Office (ATO). This effectively means you could turn $1million dollars into $1.7 million dollars of research spend in just three years.

  3. RAPID START-UP & APPROVAL
     The Australian Regulatory Framework is the fastest in the world for undertaking early phase clinical research trials
     Trials can start in 4-8 weeks compared to 10 months in the US.
     No IND required for clinical trials. Save up to a year in regulatory timelines and considerable costs.

  4. INDUSTRY-LEADING TECHNOLOGY
    Clinical trials are resource-intensive processes requiring the availability of state-of-the-art equipment and facilities for testing and analysis. We have invested heavily in the industry-leading technology platforms to support speed, communications, and regulatory compliance.

  5. GLOBAL CAPABILITIES
    Local relationships, global execution As a global contract research organization – with sites in USA and UK – we can provide internal assay transfer and validation protocols among our global sites.

    Harmonized SOPs, policies, and IT systems to facilitate transfer of methods, data, and information enable you to reduce time, risk, and cost.

  6. SEASONAL DIFFERENCES
    Seasonal differences to Europe and US, and time differences (our Australia lab works while you sleep)Seasonal differences between Australia and Europe or the US allow for yearlong participant recruitment for trials involving seasonal illnesses such as flu or allergies and allows researchers to cover seasonal variations in patient recruitment.

  7. HEALTHCARE ENVIRONMENT
    Australian clinical practices and some aspects of its health care system are similar to the United States, United Kingdom and most of Europe.

  8. DIVERSE PARTICIPANT RECRUITMENT
    The willingness of potential participants and their knowledge of clinical trials is another attractive option for sponsors to conduct trials in Australia.

    A mixed population of Caucasians and Asian adds diversity to the participant pool and enables ethnicity differences in treatment response to be studied.

Need Support to Conduct Clinical Trials in Australia?  Contact Alliance!

brochure_aus_png3

 

 

Read More

ICT Autumn 2022: How To Build a Comprehensive Response to Client Needs as a CRO

Nov 28, 2022 12:45:23 PM / by Alliance Pharma posted in Pharmaceuticals, Leadership, Philadelphia, bioanalytical, Quality, Drug Transporter, Bioanalysis, DMPK, AMS

EPC CRO _png4
As a CRO, meeting client expectations can be an ongoing challenge. What can organisations do to make sure their research is as effective and efficient as possible?

In the Autumn 2022 issue of European Pharmaceutical Contractor magazine, the leadership team from Alliance Pharma reviews what CRO organisations can do to make sure their research is as effective and efficient as possible while meeting the ongoing challenge of their customer's expectations.



Patrick Bennett, Jean Pierre Boutrand, and Vito Saccente at Alliance Pharma

Serving clients is the core of a contract research organisation’s (CRO) business. The more comprehensive a CRO’s service offerings, the more likely it is to attract and retain clients. Recent events – like the COVID-19 pandemic – have set in motion industry shifts. Such shifts demand CROs adapt so that they can continue meeting their clients’ evolving needs . . .

READ MORE

 

Read More

IN VITRO MODELS FOR PREDICTING TRANSPORTER MEDIATED DDIs

Aug 26, 2022 8:46:13 AM / by Alliance Pharma posted in Philadelphia, DDI Assessment, Drug Transporter, DMPK

IN VITRO MODELS FOR PREDICTING TRANSPORTER MEDIATED DDIs
Membrane transporters play a critical role in drug-drug interactions (DDIs). Both major types of transporters — efflux and uptake — can affect absorption and drug disposition in the body. Transporters can impact drug safety and efficacy, acting alone or in concert with drug-metabolizing enzymes.

The picture of what is happening in the body gets increasingly murky when patients take more than one drug, which is increasingly common. To obtain insights of how DDIs occur and what their consequences might be, it is vital to conduct in vitro studies and generate the data required to determine whether clinical DDI studies are needed. This is an area where Alliance excels.

In Vitro Assessment of a Transporters’ Potential Role in DDIs

The full picture of a new drug’s DDI potential involves to determine:

  • How a new drug is absorbed and eliminated
  • How enzymes and transporters contribute to its disposition
  • How to characterize the drug’s effects on enzymes and transporters

Properly designed in vitro transporter studies can support a prediction of whether a DDI through transporters is likely to be clinically relevant, and Alliance has all the tools needed to thoroughly evaluate potential transporter mediated DDIs. We use Caco-2 cells expressing efflux transporters such as P-glycoprotein (P-gp) and breast cancer resistance protein (BCRP), HEK293 cells transfected with uptake or efflux transporters including OATP1B1, OATP1B3, OAT1, OAT3, OCT1, OCT2, MATE1 and MATE2k, MDR1-MDCKII cells, and HEK293 membrane vesicles expressing P-gp, BCRP and BSEP to study transporters, which are outlined in FDA and EMA guidelines.

Helping Clients Solve Problems and Make Decisions

Our clients’ primary need regarding drug transporters is to determine whether their drug candidate is a substrate or inhibitor of a transporter, and if that is clinically relevant. Clients need to know (1) when to do these experiments and (2) how comprehensive the experiments need to be.

(1) In a clinical program, it is crucial to know when to address questions about transporter mediated drug-drug interactions. That decision is driven by the clinical study design and the timing of the in vitro evaluation — which itself can vary based on the therapeutic indications of the investigational drug. For example, if the intended population is likely to use statins, the sponsor should examine their investigational drug’s potential to interact with OATP1B1/1B3 before initiation of clinical studies in patients. Without a question, the co-medications patients are taking factor heavily, so companies must decide how restrictive they want their studies to be. To avoid these transporter studies early on (Phase I), companies can recruit and enroll only healthy volunteers with no current co-meds prescribed to them. However, when a drug is to be administered to the target patient population — patients actually affected by the disease the drug is being developed to treat — it is critical to consider issues such as co-meds, potential renal or other impairments, and the transporters of which the new drug is a substrate and/or inhibitor.

(2) The comprehensiveness of a transporter study is influenced by the relationship between predicted in vivo drug concentrations and the concentrations at which the drug is interacting with the transporter in vitro. For example, if you have a drug that is an inhibitor at a very high concentration, but that concentration will never be reached in the clinic, you might be able to justify forgoing additional testing. (FDA decision trees for this and related questions are available here.) In vivo protein binding and the free fraction of drug in the in vitro system are important data points also to understand and characterize. These are the kinds of decisions Alliance helps our clients make.

The Key Factors in Choosing a Suitable In Vitro Test System

The appropriate model for in vitro testing depends on the desired output. For example, if you need a rapid turnaround but don’t require detailed characterization of a transporter interaction, rapid screening assays are sufficient. For more comprehensive characterization to determine whether to conduct a DDI study, HEK 293 singly transfected cells or the Caco-2 cell line are very useful for characterizing the kinetics of an interaction in detail and can be used to get the output needed. Choosing the right model to deliver the most accurate prediction of how a new drug will behave in vivo is a critical step.

Validating a Model and Experimental Conditions

Know inhibtiors and substrates are used to validate the transporter study models and experimental conditions and characterize assay performance. In other words, the most well-characterized substrates in the literature — substrates that have been studied in vitro and in vivo — are used to establish the assay initially, and then the assay quality is consistently evaluated to determine that the assays are running properly. This approach allows us to build up a history of in house data and continuously assess model performance.

How Alliance Stands Out in This Area

Alliance’s range of models from cell lines to singly transfected systems provides diverse options for our clients and provides rapid turnaround or comprehensive kinetic characterization. With these models and expertise, Alliance Drug Metabolism Services is able to help our clients answer their most challenging and important questions. The bioanalytical support from the strong Bioanalytical teams at Alliance ensure the study data integrity and dependable timelines. Very few of our competitors have this diversity of models up and running routinely, setting us apart.

One unique advantage for Alliance is our in-house expertise using Caco-2 cells. This is a polarized cell line expressing efflux transporters such as P-gp, BCRP and MRP2 that is physiologically similar to human small intestine cells, making it relevant to in vivo studies. The Caco-2 cell model is a valuable tool for evaluating P-gp and BCRP-mediated transport and assessing potential DDIs.

When it comes to DDIs, drug transporters continues to evolve, and new transporters are frequently identified. More and more drug transporters have been found to be clinically relevant. Alliance is always ready to adopt and implement new models when transporters are identified as physiologically relevant to human. We also have the expertise to characterize new transporter study models lacking of regulatory guidance, for example, our recent adoption of a bile salt export pump (BSEP) model, which does not yet appear in FDA guidance.

Alliance’s team members have a unique and deep understanding on how transporter-mediated DDI studies should be designed and executed. We understand how transporters behave, how they interact, and how they can cause clinically relevant DDIs. Whether a new potential drug is at the early discovery stage or the late developmental stage, Alliance can help our clients in the transporter studies. Visit the Alliance website to explore our capabilities and expertise.

Read More

> Our Expansions and Added Resources in 2020

Nov 16, 2020 9:00:00 AM / by Ryan Klein posted in Pharmaceuticals, Conferences, DMPK

 

How has 2020 treated your company? It has been an odd year to say the least, and we are extremely grateful for the opportunities we have had in our field to work alongside and support companies, such as yours, providing medications to help people live the fullest life possible.

While we have been working with our clients on their exciting projects, we have also been working internally on growing! During the past 12 months we have expanded our footprint and capabilities within our current facility as we continue to build trusted partnerships with you – our clients! We have done this by adding the following:

Space

  • 3,000 square feet of additional office space
  • Three additional laboratories that cover approximately 1,600 square feet
  • OHC 3 – 5 lab facility
  • A BSL3 lab facility will be completed in the fourth quarter of 2020

Equipment

  • Two Agilent 6495 QqQ LC-MS/MS instruments
  • Two Agilent 8900 Triple Quad ICP-MS instruments
  • Validated Agilent Mass Hunter software
  • Two Sciex 6500+ LC-MS/MS instruments
  • New Gyrolab xPlore
  • Upgraded Watson LIMS to version 7.6.1
  • One Agilent Bio-Inert UHPLC

Staff

We have also seen a 15% growth in our staff! We continually look for scientists, lab assistants and techs, IT specialists, software developers, business development/marketing, quality assurance, fellows, and report reviewers for example. We invite you to review our openings on our website and consider joining our role serving the pharmaceutical, biotech, and agrochemical industries, as well as academia.

We look forward to working with you in the months wrapping up 2020 as well as in 2021 with our increased space, resources and staff! Please reach out to us at 610-296-3152 or info@alliancepharmaco.com to discuss how our space, equipment and staff can best meet your drug development and drug metabolism project needs.



Any further questions or need an answer?  Please contact Ryan Klein at rklein@alliancepharmaco.com or 919-801-3146.

Read More

> Making the Most of Your Virtual Conference Experience

Nov 10, 2020 2:00:00 PM / by Ryan Klein posted in Pharmaceuticals, Conferences, DMPK

 

Remember when we used to meet in person for our conference experiences? We would gather at conference centers and hotel complexes to attend great seminars, to have insightful conversation, to reconnect with old friends and to make new friends. Everything has changed this year as we all continue to adapt to the COVID-19 pandemic. We understand that many of us are sad about what we may miss, but we are thankful for the technology available that allows us to still attend conferences virtually. We know great interactions, education and conversations can still occur even if it has to happen online!

Our latest blog offers tips on how you can make the most of your virtual conference experience. We hope these tips help you as you adapt to our “new normal”. We look forward to seeing and meeting with you during virtual events in the months ahead. Thank you for the trust you put into us with your drug development and drug metabolism projects!

Tips for attending a virtual conference

We are all used to packing our bags, traveling and preparing for our interactions when it comes to attending conferences. COVID-19, however; has changed all of that this year. As many conferences are turning into virtual events, we thought we’d highlight some ways you can get the most out of your virtual conference experience.

  • Prepare mentally for attending the conference. You don't want to just "show up" online. Be prepared with any prep work you would have done prior to an in-person conference. This includes being aware of any potential distractions surrounding you, including your email and phone notifications. It’s tempting to try and multi-task in this circumstance, but do what you can to stay focused on the meeting, just like you would if you attended in person.

  • Be bold. Just as you wouldn't attend an in-person conference and stay in your room the entire time, except for a session or two, you must also be bold in these virtual settings. That means being willing to ask the questions, make the introductions and network. Many virtual conference platforms are offering video chats. Don’t be afraid to ask someone for a face-to-face call.

  • Be active on social media. Social media is a great tool for staying connected and asking questions before, during and after a virtual conference. If you aren't comfortable asking in a live event, use that hashtag to ask your questions on social media channels. Not sure you want your question in public spaces? Follow the social media channels of the conference host, speakers, panelists, sponsors, vendors and attendees, and use those direct message features or find the contact info for that direct email or phone call.

  • Take time to stroll. At a conference, you may pick up a cup of coffee and stroll through the booth areas. Do the same with virtual booth access. Vendors are supporting the virtual meeting through funding and their presence at the meeting. Provide some support for them by visiting the virtual booth and learning about their services in between presentations and during the times dedicated to the virtual exhibit hall.

  • Be patient! Just as you are learning to now navigate a virtual conference, so are all the other attendees, vendors and hosts. There will be times when technology doesn't work right, people forget to mute themselves or even random hiccups occur. Some of it may even feel awkward. Through it all, remember we are all working to adapt in the midst of all the changes COVID-19 has brought this year.

  • Don’t leave early. That last session or final connection may just be the one that makes a difference for you and your company. Make sure to take full advantage of the entire schedule and resist the temptation to head to the couch early.

You can find our conference schedule on our website and our social media channels. Please remember we may not have a table set up around the corner of the conference hall, but we are here to answer any of your questions and welcome your conversation. Visit us at our virtual booth and chat with our team through the virtual conference links at our scheduled events. You are also always welcome to contact us at 610-296-3152 or info@alliancepharmaco.com.

We look forward to seeing you at that next virtual conference!


If you’re going to any upcoming conferences and would like to meet with us, please contact Ryan Klein at rklein@alliancepharmaco.com or 919-801-3146.

Read More

> POSTERS: 12th International ISSX Meeting

Nov 15, 2019 10:30:00 AM / by Ryan Klein posted in Pharmaceuticals, Conferences, DMPK

 


Seven hundred scientists, students, and exhibitors convened at the Oregon Convention Center in Portland, Oregon, USA this past July 28–31 for ISSX2019.

Alliance Pharma is proud to have presented the three posters below.
Click poster images below to download a PDF file.

invitroDDIjpg

 

transporter_jpg

 

expansion_jpg


If you’re going to any upcoming conferences and would like to meet with us, please contact Ryan Klein at rklein@alliancepharmaco.com or 919-801-3146.

Read More

> University of Wisconsin Land O’Lakes DMPK Conference

Sep 6, 2019 10:00:00 AM / by Alliance Pharma posted in Pharmaceuticals, Conferences, DMPK

 


University of Wisconsin Land O’Lakes DMPK ConferenceThe Land O’Lakes conference series is one of the longest running and most revered teaching conferences in the pharmaceutical industry. Over the last two decades, the Land O’Lakes conferences have been developed by the division of pharmacy professional development within the school of pharmacy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and have an impeccable reputation within the pharmaceutical industry for shedding light on cutting edge topics, bringing in knowledgeable experts and having an intimate setting which lends itself to some fantastic networking opportunities. 

We at Alliance Pharma are pleased to announce that we will be attending the 22nd annual Land O’Lakes conference on Drug Metabolism and Applied Pharmacokinetics on September 9th thru September 12th in Madison, Wisconsin. We are excited and eager to hear from industry leaders on the new advances in drug delivery, action and metabolism. This years’ meeting is titled ‘Found in Translation: Adaptive DMPK Strategies’, and will include topics focused on target mediated drug disposition (TMDD), endogenous biomarkers and more.


Target mediated drug disposition requires that we think outside the box in terms of drug distribution and elimination from the body. TMDD often exhibits nonlinear pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics due to the drugs unusually high affinity to a binding site.


Endogenous biomarker research, particularly in the drug transporter area, continues to rapidly evolve. Our biomarker team at Alliance is a highly experienced team with significant expertise in biomarker method development and analysis, yet we are always eager to learn more!


If you’re going to the conference and would like to meet with us, please contact Ryan Klein at rklein@alliancepharmaco.com or 919-801-3146.

Read More