Finally, Tech to Boost Old Drugs With Hydrogen is Here

Drug makers are breathing new life into old drugs – with hydrogen. Substituting a heavier form of the gaseous element in drugs can slow their breakdown by the body, leaving them in the bloodstream longer. That means a patient can take them less frequently – and that, in theory, might reduce the severity of side effects. While the technology has been around for 40 years, it’s taken that long to understand it well enough to bring such a treatment before the US Food and Drug Administration. The regulator is reviewing that would be the first medicine made with deuterium, or heavy hydrogen.

 This is new concept, and FDA approval will make it a lot clearer for the field. Deuterium provides unique properties that cannot be attained in any other way. The approach interferes with one of the ways that the body metabolizes or eliminates drugs, involving enzymes that “nibble away” at the hydrogen in the molecule. Deuterium is essentially armored hydrogen, tougher and more difficult for the enzymes to break down, so it sticks around longer in the body. Other than that, the drug works the same as the original.