‘Innovation-first’ mindset vital for advanced therapies sector future

Improving data harmonisation and investing in the advanced therapy sector’s workforce are some of the key recommendations the sector must take to advance the field and increase patient access, a new report highlights.

A report from the Advanced Therapies Treatment Centre (ATTC) Network has highlighted urgent need for rapid change and improvement in the field to maximise patient access to advanced therapies.

It was compiled based on expertise gathered at the ATTC Network’s UK Advanced Therapies Adoption Challenge event in October. At the event, attendees discussed barriers and develop solutions to the advanced therapies adoption challenge.

Supporting the future of the advanced therapies sector

Overall, the report calls to establish a new, multi-stakeholder, cross-departmental advanced therapies taskforce. 

According to the ATTC Network, experts at the event suggested investment into reinforcing the UK’s already highly skilled research workforce and expediting clinical trial approvals. These actions were outlined as key priorities in the report, to facilitate rapid action and an ‘innovation-first’ mindset.

An overview of the list of recommendations and solutions to the challenge included in the report were as follows:

Leverage existing world-leading expertise to enable the UK to be the best place internationally to trial and deliver these medicines
Realise the value of these therapies to ensure that UK patients can benefit from the latest cutting-edge health technologies
Invest in supporting workforce and delivery infrastructure to allow the UK to benefit from advanced therapy delivery at scale
Improve the use of data system-wide to harmonise the ecosystem for these treatments.

The ATTC Network highlighted that over the past five years, new cell and gene therapies have been developed to treat some cancers and inherited diseases, yet these innovative treatments have different obstacles when compared to traditional medicines.

The UK advanced therapy community is poised to lead the way in the research, testing and implementation of these therapies, however change is needed to deliver these ambitious at scale, the organisation noted.

“Delivering advanced therapies at scale is essential to realising the true value of cell and gene therapies and the opportunity they provide to transform healthcare. By ensuring that patients have access to these transformative medicines when approved, the health system will meet demand, bring down cost and stimulate investment,” stated Matthew Durdy, Chief Executive at the Cell and Gene Therapy Catapult. 

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