Science

Adaptive tissue repair

In health our bodies maintain a natural equilibrium (homeostasis) whereby cellular and tissue damage is balanced by our capacity to repair.  But as we age, and in chronic illness, balance is disrupted -the accumulation of damage exceeds the body’s capacity for repair. This change in homeostasis results, eventually, in full blown disease, with cycles of tissue damage, inflammation and thwarted or uncontrolled, attempts to repair.

At least a third (33.7%) of people with one chronic disease are subsequently diagnosed with multiple chronic diseases. Disability resulting from chronic disease contributes to the global loss of 1.73 billion years of full health- travelling back in time, that would be 1.5 billion years before dinosaurs roamed the earth and when the only life forms were single cells. It’s not surprising, then, that chronic disease is a key driver of high healthcare costs.

Despite progress, current treatment approaches focus on controlling symptoms or slowing decline, often by supressing the immune system and minimising inflammation to slow down disease progression. However, symptoms reappear, disease continues, and the damage persists. One reason for this may be that by suppressing the immune system, the body’s natural repair process is also suppressed; by stopping inflammation the body’s natural repair process is impeded.

Our treatments work by modulating the mitochondria – the beating heart of the body’s cells, responsible for energy production and central to everyday cell function. By targeting cells with high energy requirements and low metabolic flexibility, turning different metabolic pathways on or off, affecting how cells behave and function, our medicines promote the body’s natural ability to repair.

This novel mode of action works to support tissue repair and regain lost function:

• Reversing and resolving the damage that accumulates in chronic disease
• Reducing and potentially eliminating further tissue decline
• Protecting from cycles of inflammation and further disease progression without immunosuppression and by promoting normal immune ‘housekeeping’