Combination therapeutics in complex diseases

Bing He; Cheng Lu; Guang Zheng; Xiaojuan He; Maolin Wang; Gao Chen; Ge Zhang; Aiping Lu

doi:10.1111/jcmm.12930

Combination therapeutics in complex diseases

J Cell Mol Med. 2016 Dec;20(12):2231-2240. doi: 10.1111/jcmm.12930. Epub 2016 Sep 7.

Authors

Bing He^{1

2}, Cheng Lu^{1

2

3}, Guang Zheng^{1

2}, Xiaojuan He^{1

2

3}, Maolin Wang^{1

2}, Gao Chen^{1

2}, Ge Zhang^{1

2}, Aiping Lu^{1

2

3}

Affiliations

¹ Institute for Advancing Translational Medicine in Bone & Joint Diseases, School of Chinese Medicine, Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong, China.
² Institute of Integrated Bioinformedicine & Translational Science, HKBU Shenzhen Research Institute and Continuing Education, Shenzhen, China.
³ Institute of Basic Research in Clinical Medicine, China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences, Beijing, China.

Abstract

The biological redundancies in molecular networks of complex diseases limit the efficacy of many single drug therapies. Combination therapeutics, as a common therapeutic method, involve pharmacological intervention using several drugs that interact with multiple targets in the molecular networks of diseases and may achieve better efficacy and/or less toxicity than monotherapy in practice. The development of combination therapeutics is complicated by several critical issues, including identifying multiple targets, targeting strategies and the drug combination. This review summarizes the current achievements in combination therapeutics, with a particular emphasis on the efforts to develop combination therapeutics for complex diseases.

Keywords: combination therapeutics; complex diseases; molecular network.

Publication types

Review
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Animals
Cell Line
Computational Biology
Disease Models, Animal
Disease*
Drug Combinations*
Drug Synergism
Drug Therapy, Combination
Humans

Substances

Drug Combinations