By Gareth Iacobucci
The first drug to offer two individual therapies for benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) in one pill has been approved for use in the UK.
GlaxoSmithKline's Combodart – a new once-daily combination pill, is being introduced to combat disease progression and provide symptom relief.
The treatment - a fixed-dose combination of the 5-alpha reductase inhibitor dutasteride and the alpha blocker tamsulosin hydrochloride - has been cleared by regulators to treat moderate-to-severe BPH and reduce the risk of acute urinary retention (AUR) and BPH-related surgery.
The drug has been approved following a clinical trial which showed that the combination of Combodart reduced the risk of AUR or BPH-related surgery by 66% compared with tamsulosin alone, and that the combo also cut the risk of disease progression by 44% versus tamsulosin and 31% compared with dutasteride alone.
