New perspectives for leishmaniasis chemotherapy over current anti-leishmanial drugs: a patent landscape.
INTRODUCTION
Although leishmaniasis is estimated to cause the ninth largest disease burden among individual infectious diseases, it is still one of the most neglected diseases in terms of drug development. Current drugs are highly toxic, resistance is common and compliance of patients to treatment is low, as treatment is long and drug price is high.


AREAS COVERED
In this review, the authors carried out a patent landscape in search for new perspectives for leishmaniasis therapy. This search encompassed patent documents having priority date between 1994 and 2014. Selected compounds were compared to current anti-leishmanial drugs regarding efficacy and toxicity, when experimental data were available.


EXPERT OPINION
Most patents related to drugs for leishmaniasis have not been produced by the pharmaceutical industry but rather by public research institutes or by universities, and the majority of the inventions disclosed are still in preclinical phase. There is an urgent need to find new ways of funding research for leishmaniasis drugs, incentivizing product development partnerships and pushing forward innovation.
['Machado-Silva|Alice|A|', 'Guimarães|Pedro Pires Goulart|PP|', 'Tavares|Carlos Alberto Pereira|CA|', 'Sinisterra|Rubén Dario|RD|']
D000818:Animals D000981:Antiprotozoal Agents D016527:Drug Costs D015195:Drug Design D004351:Drug Resistance D006801:Humans D007896:Leishmaniasis D055118:Medication Adherence D058069:Neglected Diseases D010330:Patents as Topic D012109:Research Support as Topic
patents leishmaniasis therapy amphotericin B meglumine antimoniate miltefosine paramomycin pentamidine