As described in a recent
article in NATURE, the emergent field
of ‘electroceuticals’ is an exciting new thrust for therapeutic research. GSK
should be congratulated for boldly seeking to catalyze rapid development of
this area. The connections are readily apparent between the electroceutical approach, the Brain
Activity Map efforts announced recently, and continuing developments in
nanotechnology.
However, this novel approach
comes with many questions and problems. Assuming that progress is made in treating
a disease state using neuronal stimulation, how does one go about assessing
benefit versus risk? In conventional drug discovery there are well-established
approaches for evaluating potential toxicities at the pre-clinical and clinical
levels. But it is not clear yet how risk assessment will be conducted in the
new realm of electroceuticals where therapies may need to be based on the
unique neuronal wiring patterns of individuals. An interesting issue for the future.
No comments:
Post a Comment