The Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation (PFF) today announced a new collaboration that could speed up the development of targeted treatments for individuals with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), a devastating and progressive lung disease. The national patient advocacy organization and Celgene, a wholly owned subsidiary of Bristol-Myers Squibb, have created a consortium called the Prognostic Lung Fibrosis Consortium (PROLIFIC) to develop well-qualified assays to detect important peripheral blood protein biomarkers in patients with pulmonary fibrosis. The assays will be used to uncover early indicators of a drug’s activity. PROLIFIC industry members include Biogen, Genentech, Lung Therapeutics, OptiKira, Pliant Therapeutics, and Respivant Sciences. The group has selected 12 biomarkers based on published scientific reports describing their prognostic utility for the disease itself and their potential predictive utility for how well a drug works. In addition, the biomarkers may be useful for comparing the biological activity of different therapeutic interventions across trials. To read more visit PROLIFIC.
