Innovative Pharmaceutical Companies are Finding Ways to Create Drugs that Can be Used Instead of Surgery, According to Millennium Research Group

April 5, 2007—Waltham, Massachusetts— Millennium Research Group (MRG) has conducted a detailed analysis of surgical procedures in its US Surgical Procedure Volumes 2007 report, which is intended to serve as a valuable tool to identify opportunities in the surgical space for pharmaceutical companies. More patients prefer drugs rather than going under the knife in an invasive surgical procedure and innovative pharmaceutical companies are meeting this need through new drug therapies.

“There is tremendous opportunity for pharmaceuticals to target the surgical space,” says Adrienne Lovink, Manager at MRG. “For example, in the cardio space drugs such as Lipitor have served as the first line of treatment for cardiovascular patients and have prevented patients from going under the knife.”

Stress urinary incontinence (SUI) is another treatment shifting over to drugs. Before 2004 (SUI) was dominated almost exclusively by surgical treatment and other nonpharmacological approaches; major-market sales of the few drugs used to treat this condition barely topped $5 million. However, by 2013, the SUI pharmaceutical market will reach $378 million.* Key pharmaceutical companies that are investigating markets in surgical procedures include Arachnova, Merck & Co, Wyeth, Ferring, Pfizer, Novo Nordisk, Eli Lilly, AstraZeneca, Bristol-Myers Squibb, GlaxoSmithKline.

MRG’s US Surgical Procedure Volumes 2007 covers over 200 different procedures including anesthetic, cardiovascular, dental, diagnostic imaging, endoscopy, general surgery, gynecology, neurosurgery, ophthalmology, orthopedics, urology, and varicose vein procedures. MRG also has similar coverage of Japanese and European surgical procedures.