The FAST Forum is an interactive platform designed for professionals involved in the development of new therapies to connect, collaborate, and share insights. This online community fosters open discussions on various topics, including drug discovery, clinical trials, regulatory affairs, and biopharmaceutical manufacturing. Members can participate in discussions, ask questions, share experiences, and access a wealth of knowledge from experts in the field. The goal of the FAST Forum is to facilitate the exchange of ideas, promote best practices, and support the collective advancement of innovative therapies. By joining the FAST Forum, individuals and organizations can stay informed about the latest industry trends, gain valuable insights, and contribute to a dynamic and supportive professional network. Before replying or starting new topics, please review the FAST forum disclaimer and terms of use and the privacy statement

Please use this category to discuss about this forum, its organization, how it works, and how we can improve it. We appreciate your suggestions for improvement!

FAST is an independent national centre of expertise and collaboration in the Netherlands, devoted to driving innovation in therapy development. Serving as a dynamic network infrastructure, FAST consolidates knowledge, fosters dialogues, and engages an extensive range of experts. This is achieved by experimenting with new technologies and methods for drug research and development and facilitating validation and application with the needs and preferences of the patient as the starting point. According to FAST, there are significant opportunities to enhance therapy development in a social responsibe manner in the following areas:

Therapy development is not only time consuming and costly, but also highly regulated. New therapies can only become accessible to patients, if data and results from (pre-)clinical trials demonstrate that the therapy is of sufficient quality, has a favourable benefit-risk ratio for patients and is cost-effective. To ensure that new therapies reach patients efficiently, it is important that regulatory pathways and requirements are flexibible and adaptive to enable the implementation of new methods and the evaluation of new therapies based on innovative technologies and state-of-the-art science. You can pose all your questions related to the different therapy development stages in this category. Please use tags to cross reference to other categories.

Pharmaceutical patents are exclusive rights granted to inventors, pharmaceutical companies, or research organizations to protect their innovations in drug development. Patents are considered crucial assets within therapy development as they allow the inventor rights over an invention for typically 20 years post filing. These inventions could include information on drug formulation, dosage or efficacy, as well as information on the product properties of leads or pre-clinical candidates.

The Funding category provides information on financial resources and opportunities available for the development of new therapies. This includes grants, venture capital, public and private funding programs, and other financial support mechanisms that can help researchers, startups, and established companies advance their therapeutic projects. The goal is to connect innovators with the necessary financial resources to support their research, development, and commercialization efforts, help to navigate the funding landscape and prepare successful applications. This category also offers guidance on how to apply socialy responsible licensing. Socially responsible licensing means that account must be taken of the effective availability of the products or services to be developed based on the licensed knowledge.

Innovative method and technologies have the potential to speed-up therapy development and derisking the development process in an early stage. For example, through rapid screening methods, innovative data mining, and a better understanding of complex disease mechanisms, the number of substances and biological targets to be investigated have strongly increased. Innovative technologies, including human stem cell models like organoids and organs-on-a-chip, have the potential to evaluate the feasbility of therapy lead earlier in the development process, due to significantly enhanced predictive value. Innovative methodologies, including integrative mathematical modeling, trial methodology, real-world data and learning healthcare systems can speed-up clinical studies and implementation in the clinical practice. The field faces the challenge of implementation including further development, regulatory acceptance, often including qualification or validation, and adoption in therapy development practice of these enabling methods and technologies.

The Education category focuses on teaching, training, and fostering talent in drug development. It covers educational resources, strategies for building human capital, and advancing knowledge across all phases of therapeutic innovation.

The Netherlands has a long tradition of professional patient representation and a well-organized network of patient organizations. Patient involvement in the development of therapies is important to ensure that therapies meet real-world needs. As a researcher, finding your way towards meaningful patient involvement for your project can be challenging. However, many patient organizations specialize in connecting researchers with the appropriate patient partners. These organizations often provide valuable guidance and can help researchers to find a patient (representative) whose experiences align with the goals of the study. For patients, these organizations can be an excellent point of contact to ask questions, understand the research process and explore opportunities to contribute to the development of new therapies.