FDA Fast Track Development Program

Regulation of therapeutic goods in the United States

Prescription drugs Over-the-counter drugs
Law Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970 Controlled Substances Act Prescription Drug Marketing Act Drug Price Competition and Patent Term Restoration Act Hatch-Waxman exemption
Government agencies Department of Health and Human Services Food and Drug Administration Department of Justice Drug Enforcement Administration
Process Drug discovery Drug design Drug development New drug application Investigational new drug Clinical trial (Phase I, II, III, IV) Randomized controlled trial Pharmacovigilance Abbreviated New Drug Application Fast track approval Off-label use
International coordination International Conference on Harmonisation of Technical Requirements for Registration of Pharmaceuticals for Human Use Uppsala Monitoring Centre World Health Organization Council for International Organizations of Medical Sciences Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs
Non-governmental organizations Institute of Medicine Research on Adverse Drug events And Reports

The FDA Fast Track Designation is a designation of the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) that facilitates the development, and expedites the review, of drugs which treat a serious or life-threatening condition and fill an unmet medical need. Fast Track designation must be requested by the drug company. The request can be initiated at any time during the drug development process. FDA will review the request and attempt to make a decision within sixty days.

Purpose

The purpose of Fast Track designation is to get important new drugs to the patient earlier.

It was introduced by the FDA Modernization Act of 1997.^[1]

Requirements

Fast track designation is designed to aid in the development and expedite the review of drugs which show promise in treating a serious or life-threatening disease and address an unmet medical need.

Serious Condition: Determining whether a disease is serious is a matter of judgment, but generally is based on whether the drug will have an impact on such factors as survival, day-to-day functioning, or the likelihood that the disease, if left untreated, will progress from a less severe condition to a more serious one.

Unmet Medical Need: For a drug to address an unmet medical need, the drug must be developed as a treatment or preventative measure for a disease that does not have a current therapy. The type of information necessary to demonstrate unmet medical need varies with the stage of drug development: early in development, nonclinical data, mechanistic rationale, or pharmacologic data will suffice; later in development, clinical data should be utilized. If there are existing therapies, a fast track eligible drug must show some advantage over available treatment, such as:

Showing superior effectiveness
Avoiding serious side effects of an available treatment
Improving the diagnosis of a serious disease where early diagnosis results in an improved outcome
Decreasing a clinically significant toxicity of an available treatment
Addressing an expected public health need

Incentives

A drug that receives Fast Track designation is eligible for some or all of the following:

More frequent meetings with FDA to discuss the drug’s development plan and ensure collection of appropriate data needed to support drug approval
More frequent written correspondence from FDA about such things as the design of the proposed clinical trials
Accelerated Approval or priority review if the requisite criteria are met. Accelerated approval is meant for drugs that demonstrate an effect on a surrogate, or intermediate endpoint reasonably likely to predict clinical benefit. Priority review shortens the FDA review process for a new drug from ten months to six months, and is appropriate for drugs that demonstrate significant improvements in both safety and effectiveness of an existing therapy. A fast track application is automatically considered for both of these designations.
Rolling Review, which means that a drug company can submit completed sections of its New Drug Application (NDA) for review by FDA, rather than waiting until every section of the application is completed before the entire application can be reviewed. NDA review usually does not begin until the drug company has submitted the entire application to the FDA

An FDA decision not to grant Fast Track status, or any other general dispute, may be appealed to the division responsible for reviewing the application within the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research. The drug sponsor can subsequently utilize the Agency’s procedures for internal review or dispute resolution if necessary.

Once a drug receives Fast Track designation, early and frequent communication between the FDA and a drug company is encouraged throughout the entire drug development and review process. The frequency of communication assures that questions and issues are resolved quickly, often leading to earlier drug approval and access by patients.

Statistics

2011: According to Nov 2011 page on FDA website, Fast Track has generated the following workload for the 2011 fiscal year:^[2]

Submitted : 92 applications :

Reviewed within 60 days: Granted - 58, Denied - 23, Currently pending - 10
Reviewed for longer than 60 days: Granted - 7, Denied - 6, Currently pending - 2

References

Reichert JM, Rochon SL, Zhang BD (November 2008). "A decade of the Fast Track programme". Nat Rev Drug Discov 7 (11): 885–6. doi:10.1038/nrd2733. PMID 18948998.

External links

"Fast Track, Breakthrough Therapy, Accelerated Approval and Priority Review". For Patients and Patient Advocates. United States Food and Drug Administration.
U.S. Dept. of HHS, FDA, CDER, and CBER, Guidance for Industry: Expedited Programs for Serious Conditions – Drugs and Biologics, CENTER FOR DRUG EVALUATION AND RESEARCH, at 9 (June 2013), available at http://www.fda.gov/downloads/Drugs/GuidanceComplianceRegulatoryInformation/Guidances/UCM358301.pdf.
Henninger, Daniel (2002). "Drug Lag". In David R. Henderson (ed.). Concise Encyclopedia of Economics (1st ed.). Library of Economics and Liberty. OCLC 317650570, 50016270 and 163149563
Fast Track Approvals FDA

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