An Overview of the Mental Disorder Field in China

I. Introduction

Mental disorder refers to the varying degrees of disorder of cognition, emotion, behavior and will, etc. caused by disorder of brain functional activity. Mental disorder diseases have complicated pathogenesis, and are difficult to treat, with easy relapse, bringing a great burden to patients, families and society. Mental disorders are currently based on drug treatment, and the relevant drugs are roughly divided into the following five categories by indication: 1) antidepressants; 2) antipsychotic drugs; 3) sedative-hypnotic drugs; 4) anti-anxiety drugs; 5) other mental disorder drugs. This article will introduce the market situation of mental disorder field in China, market shares of enterprises, enterprise market shares in segments, and best-selling drugs in segments, etc. And 2 Chinese enterprises and 2 overseas enterprises with outstanding performance in the mental disorder field will be introduced in the future.

II. Market Situation

According to the sample hospital database, the sales of the mental disorder drug field reached RMB 4.57 billion in China in 2017, growing by 9.7% year on year; this field includes antidepressants, antipsychotic drugs, sedative-hypnotic drugs, anti-anxiety drugs, and other mental disorder drugs. As shown in the following figure, antidepressants accounted for the largest share (41%), followed by antipsychotic drugs (31%).

Fig. 1 Proportions of Drugs in Mental Disorder Field in China

We can see from the above figure that sales of antidepressants and antipsychotic drugs accounted for over 70% of drugs of the entire mental disorder field, occupying the absolute dominance. Let’s next see the data of market shares of enterprises on the Chinese market, after a basic understanding of the sales proportions of the mental disorder segments: we can see from Fig. 2 that the Chinese enterprise Hengrui occupied 14% market share, being far ahead, followed by Lundbeck, Eli Lilly and Hansoh with market share of separately 10%, 9% and 9%.

Fig. 2 Analysis of Shares of Mental Disorder Drug Enterprises in China in 2017

The above top four enterprises by market share have different emphases: Hengrui mainly offers sedative-hypnotic drugs represented by dexmedetomidine, Lundbeck is a pharmaceutical enterprise that focuses on psychoneurotic drugs, involving depression, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease and schizophrenia, etc., with the product line covering extensive, Eli Lilly’s main products are fluoxetine hydrochloride, olanzapine, duloxetine hydrochloride, and atomoxetine hydrochloride, with outstanding performance in anti-depression, and Hansoh has done well in antipsychotic field upon the RMB 390 million sales of olanzapine in 2017.

III. Market Situation of Enterprises in the Mental Disorder Segments

Fig. 3 Rankings of Enterprises in Antipsychotic Field in China in 2017

According to the sample hospital database, Hansoh came out top in the antipsychotic field upon RMB 390 million sales. Eli Lilly conducted years of patent litigation from 2002 on the ground of patent infringement of Hansoh’s olanzapine, however, Hansoh won at last. The winning in the patent dispute has swept away patent obstacles of Hansoh’ olanzapine, and laid a solid function for its becoming of a leader on olanzapine market in China.

Fig. 4 Rankings of Enterprises in Anti-depression Field in China in 2017

We can see from the above figure that Lundbeck had outstanding performance in the anti-depression field, ranking top with RMB 450 million sales, mainly thanks to its antidepressants: vortioxetine hydrobromide, escitalopram oxalate and citalopram hydrobromide, and Eli Lilly also did well upon its fluoxetine hydrochloride, duloxetine hydrochloride, and atomoxetine hydrochloride, etc.

 IV. Best-selling Drugs

In the segments of antidepressants, sedative-hypnotic drugs, antipsychotic drugs, and anti-anxiety drugs, those with the highest sales proportion in respective segment were separately escitalopram (22%), dexmedetomidine (69%), olanzapine (46%) and tandospirone (39%).

V. Summary

The above is an introduction of the basic market situation of drugs in the mental disorder field of China, and Chinese and overseas pharmaceutical enterprises with outstanding performance in mental disorder field will be introduced in the future. Please stay tuned.

Any error or omission pointed out and corrected for the above content will be much appreciated.

About the author: W&D, a practitioner in the pharmaceutical industry, interested in research for project approval, patent retrieval and analysis, pharmaceutical industry dynamics, and new pharmaceutical technologies and methods, wishing to share and discuss pharmaceutical industry changes with everyone through articles.

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