This all makes sense! I’ve heard there is a similar effect for single cell research, where a lot of the study of human cells says that they are full of support structures and making all kinds of chemical signals that actually are a stress response to being placed on a piece of glass rather than floating in liquid. Kudos to these researchers for making an honest attempt to get it right.
Why Drugs That Work in Mice Don't Work in Humans
41–50 of 116 posts
Re: Why Drugs That Work in Mice Don't Work in Humans
#42Model animals are used in researches mostly due to two reasons: cost, which is always a big hurdle for academic studies; and reproduction, especially for inbred mice. The use of inbred mice often is because the behavior and activity of the mice is well-characterized, high availability, and genetically more consistent. However, the second part nowadays is often challenged and they are not that consistently genetically as researches show. For drug development, the very first step is to create an animal model, however, this one also is difficult, since more often than not one cannot generate animal model replicates all symptoms, this could mean a model without the actual cause. I think this is also a reason why genetic studies of diseases nowadays is still a hot field, from there one can make an animal model and test whether that gene is the real cause in more confidence.
Re: Why Drugs That Work in Mice Don't Work in Humans
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is an alternate. To wake up from the ignorant direction the so called studies are taking the human kind to. And stop calling it science. Dr. B.M. Hedge suggested long ago that all the studies done on animals or humans are wrong and inefficient in so many fronts. His words - According to ayurveda, human body can be classified into around 200 types based on the K/P/H balance of a body. A medicine that works for o…
I don't get it. If you can't trust researchers who perform studies to validate their results, then what is it which makes this guy trustworthy to you? He has done strictly less than that to validate his results.
I am not against validity through studies. But the approach/methodology taken in most studies on food/drugs are very limited in nature and often flawed giving skewed results (e.g. I hope everyone knows about the approach taken in dividing fat into 3 categories and how it is taken as reference to ruin health of so many humans over decades through refined oils). I totally agree with him in that regard.
Re: Why Drugs That Work in Mice Don't Work in Humans
#44What about drugs that work in humans, but not in mice? Could you ever get them into trials without animal data?
If I'm remembering correctly Aspirin is a drug which doesn't have the intended effect in mice studies.
I could be wrong about the exact drug but it is something similarly common if it isn't. Hard to google because there are a million studies which pop up.
Re: Why Drugs That Work in Mice Don't Work in Humans
#45Test the drugs on poor children without asking. No one will notice.
Re: Why Drugs That Work in Mice Don't Work in Humans
#46How many of these drugs actually do work in mice? Every study that comes out on the topic shows at least 50% and often closer to 90% of preclinical research does not replicate or even is not replicable in principle.
Re: Why Drugs That Work in Mice Don't Work in Humans
#47I'm not sure how common the practice is, but I've been told (by a trusted source) that if a med study doesn't get the desired results they just get a new set of mice and try again. That is, results can vary based on the mice used for reasons not understood (but gut bacteria perhaps).
I work in pre-clinical pharma research, and this isn't really true in my experience, but there are a couple caveats. At least in my experience, we wouldn't run the same study again, but we might change the model. There are a few models that all point to a similar indication, so we might try both. If a treatment works in one but not the other, it's definitely seen as less strong evidence of efficacy, unless there's so…
I'm interested in how compounds are chosen for medical research. Do you just start with a wide range of compounds which you are able to make and fire them at a range of different potential medical issues? That seems staggeringly unlikely to find something useful.
I know some drugs are extracted by isolating a compound from a traditional remedy. That obviously makes sense.
Re: Why Drugs That Work in Mice Don't Work in Humans
#48Any mice trial should use 4 different breeds: one of the academic hallmark (black6 or balb/c) for publication purpose, one that represent your model (or so you think) because that’s the logical thing to do, and a truly wild type one (captured in the wild) to capture the noise. Even this bias longevity piece needs to do that. This 4 breeds will all have different immune system, cognitive behavior and lifestyles, which…
That makes 3...
Re: Why Drugs That Work in Mice Don't Work in Humans
#49"Only 14% of drugs that are tested on humans succeed in demonstrating effectiveness[1], and all of these are drugs that have been found efficacious in animals, so successful animal studies are very far from a guarantee by themselves."
Regardless of the reason, this seems fine/workable. Animal studies are a step in the funnel. I assume the step from petri dish to mouse is similar.
I wonder how many false negatives get produced. Drugs which would have worked on humans, but don't on mice, for similar reasons.
Re: Why Drugs That Work in Mice Don't Work in Humans
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
Good luck getting people to allow their pets being used for research!
People are actually very motivated to contribute to science, here's an example of research involving pets and extending their healthspan across aging: http://dogagingproject.com Phase I clinical trial: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/pmid/28374166/ Phase II is in progress. Interview with Matt Kaeberlein from the project: https://www.leafscience.org/dr-matt-kaeberlein-the-dog-aging...
This is a study of a new application of a drug that has already had very extensive trials in both humans and several species of animals that have demonstrated it to be safe (it's FDA approved for human use). I think you will find people dramatically less willing to test brand new drugs on their pets.