Structure-based drug design for hypoxia-inducible factor prolyl-hydroxylase inhibitors and its therapeutic potential for the treatment of erythropoiesis-stimulating agent-resistant anemia: raising expectations for exploratory clinical trials

Despite the fact that structure-based drug design has dramatically improved drug discovery, testing on humans is still one of the most time-consuming parts of drug discovery and one that is not accelerated by structural approaches. Exploratory clinical trials, first-in-man studies have emerged as a new strategy for preclinical and clinical development of drugs. Exploratory clinical trials will not only reduce the time and cost in preclinical trials but also provide important information on candidate drug's pharmacological effects in humans. Exploratory clinical trials may be a potential alternative strategy for the drug discovery in the future.