Our major therapeutic areas

At this time, sanofi-aventis R&D's main objective is to provide patients with effective well-tolerated medicines, at the earliest possible time. When it comes to diseases that are difficult to treat, such as Alzheimer's or depression, oncology or diabetes, we increase our chances of developing groundbreaking treatments that will provide real patient benefit by multiplying and diversifying pharmacological and scientific approaches. This is the reason why clinical trials may be carried out simultaneously on different compounds to treat the same disease and indication.

Furthermore, research must take into account the amazing complexity of the human body. Division into therapeutic areas is a way of isolating systems whose functions are sometimes interconnected. Cooperation and exchange between the various teams are crucial in the early stages as a way of identifying processes which are common to different systems. For this reason, certain compounds may sometimes be under study in programmes involving two different therapeutic areas.

These diseases are crucial public health issues because they are the principle causes of global mortality. It is for that reason that sanofi-aventis has concentrated its research efforts on those subjects for which the Group has developed world-renowned expertise.

• Cardiovascular diseases
• Thrombosis
• Metabolic disorders
• Oncology
• Central nervous system
• Internal medicine
• Vaccines