Isotrex Gel 0.05% was first launched in the UK by Stiefel Laboratories Ltd on 10 November 2002. It was primarily used to treat acne vulgaris in adolescents and contained isotretinoin, a compound similar to Vitamin A.
The first parallel import appeared in the UK in July 2005, which means that this product had 2 1/2 year honeymoon period without serious competition. However, once they had identified the market the importers quickly introduced sufficient stock to require over 10 adverts in wholesaler price lists each month. The number of offers in these price lists sent to pharmacies and dispensing doctors increased gradually from 4 in July 2005 to 46 in Jan 2011. In mid 2011 there was a sudden crash in the number of price list mentions, from over 40 back to just 4. This was probably caused by a serious supply disruption. There was some recovery after this sudden crash and by mid 2015 there were 21 price list entries each month. But the market had changed and did not demand as much stock as previously. By early 2019 there was just 1 entry each month. The last sign of parallel imports was in January 2020, after which this product dissapeared from the UK primary care marketplace.
Curiously the prices that were on offer for this product didn’t vary enormously right through the 15 years during which the PI was available. Prices started at about £5.40 during the period between 2005 and 2010 but then rose gradually to about £5.80. There was no generic follow-on products seen in the data, which suggests that this was a therapeutic change prompted by changes in the medical advice.
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