United States increased by 111% between 2005 and 2014, despite there being no proportional increase in the costs of other prescription drugs. However, alteplase continues to be cost-effective. Brand names Alteplase is marketed as Actilyse, Activase, and Cathflo or Cathflo Activase. History FDA approval and paradigm shift Alteplase was approved for medical use in the United States in November 1987 for the treatment of myocardial infarction. This was just seven years after the first efforts were made to produce recombinant t-PA, making it one of the fastest drug developments in history. In 1995, a study by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke showed the effectiveness of administering intravenous alteplase to treat ischemic stroke. This sparked a medical paradigm shift as it redesigned stroke treatment in the emergency department to allow for timely assessment and therapy for ischemic stroke patients. Commercialization Commercialization and large scale manufacture of human t-PA has been made possible through the generation of Chinese hamster ovary cells, which are capable of producing alteplase (recombinant human t-PA) with the use of recombinant DNA technology. Brands include Activase and Cathflo Activase, marketed by Genentech Inc. in the US, and Actilyse, marketed by Boehringer Ingelheim in Germany. References Further reading External links Antithrombotic enzymes Boehringer Ingelheim Genentech brands Hoffmann-La Roche brands World Health Organization essential medicines Wikipedia medicine articles ready to translate Ophthalmology drugs