Products > Discovery
Acacia has developed a product discovery engine which identifies proprietary medicines, based upon established drugs, within its therapeutic areas of interest. Publicly and commercially available databases, search engines and data-mining techniques are used to generate data which can be interrogated using Acacia’s therapeutically focused discovery database. Using these tools, key unmet medical needs are linked to existing/new biology and established drugs, in order to generate a series of product concepts. Currently Acacia is concentrating its discovery efforts within cancer related fatigue, cancer cachexia and xerostomia.
Cancer related fatigue
Cancer related fatigue (CRF) is the most common symptom reported by cancer patients, with an estimated incidence of 60-90%, and has a profound impact on patients’ quality of life. It has important implications for cancer care in that patients may discontinue their primary cancer treatments, may be limited in the dose they can tolerate and may suffer behavioural or mood disorders which significantly affect daily living. An important aspect of CRF is that it is not relieved by rest. It may be present before treatment begins, then increase during the course of the cancer treatment and can persist for several years after the treatment is finished. As the overall incidence of cancer – and the trend to more chronic treatment of the disease increases – CRF is set to increase as a problem, exacerbated by the high incidence of fatigue as a side effect of several newer anti-cancer agents.
Cancer cachexia
The word "cachexia" comes from the Greek words "kakos" and "hexis", meaning "bad conditions". Cachexia is a complex metabolic status with progressive weight loss and depletion of host reserves of adipose tissue and skeletal muscle. Cachexia should be suspected if involuntary weight loss of greater than five percent, relative to premorbid weight, occurs within a six-month period. Involuntary weight loss, tissue wasting, poor performance, and ultimately death are features of cancer cachexia. It is a condition of advanced protein calorie malnutrition. Cachexia is one of the most debilitating and life-threatening aspects of cancer. It increases in prevalence from 50% to more than 80% before death and in more than 20% of patients is the main cause of death.
Xerostomia
Most patients with head and neck cancer are treated with radiotherapy, often with concurrent chemotherapy. For such pa¬tients, there is a predictable incidence of dry mouth, or xerostomia, of 78 to 95%. Xerostomia occurs when the salivary glands produce too little saliva and can result from damage to the glands caused by radiotherapy and by certain types of chemotherapy drugs given alone or in combination. Saliva is needed for taste, swallowing, and speech. It helps prevent infection and tooth decay by neutralizing acid and cleaning the teeth and gums.