SCIENTISTS in NSW are a step closer to developing a drug to help many of the 4.6 million Australians suffering from high blood pressure.
And it's all thanks to the invention of a technique involving a previously forgotten protein, recently rediscovered by scientists at the Victor Chang Institute in Sydney.
The breakthrough means scientists will be able to target their drug testing more efficiently, speeding up the process of discovery.
High blood pressure, or hypertension, can lead to heart attack, stroke or even sudden death if not monitored properly.
Five major types of medication control the symptoms of hypertension, but lead scientist Tony Ngo said these drugs don't work for up to 30 per cent of sufferers.
His team hopes to create a sixth drug classification that will get to the cause of hypertension, not just treat the symptoms.
To do so Mr Ngo developed a way to pin-point the most effective drugs that act on the overlooked hypertension-linked protein.
He invented the new technique after finding the existing process was very time consuming and expensive.
"Before this method we were just screening drugs blindly in the hope that we'd find something," Mr Ngo said.
"Now we can actually identify what drugs interact with our proteins before we even start testing, which cuts the process in half."
Previously it would have cost scientists about $120,000 to test up to 6000 drugs at random, which often ended in failed results. Now scientists can test the correct drugs straight away and be guaranteed results.
