Potassium-Competitive Acid Blockers and Proton Pump Inhibitors in Peptic Ulcer Disea Se: A Comparative Review Highlighting Vonoprazan

Peptic ulcer disease (PUD) is also one of the most common gastrointestinal tract diseases that occur in most parts of the world. Proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) have long remained the basis of treatment. But continuous clinical practice experience has shown that a number of disadvantages are associated with the PPIs including delay in onset of therapeutic effect, an acid breakthrough in the nocturnal hours, and genetic polymorphism of the response. Moreover, reduced release of gastric acid as well as reduced concentration of other gastric factors such as pepsin, intrinsic factor and vitamin C when they are used over an extended period has led to the issue of deficiency and the associated health risk factors. Such issues have urged the study and invention of more recent acid-repressive medicines. Vonoprazan is a recently developed potassium competitive acid blocker (P-CAB) (vonoprazan fumarate) (TAK-438) to address the limitations inherent in the conventional PPIs. The following review aims at providing pharmacological discussions about vonoprazan with particular focus on mechanism of action, pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic considerations, therapeutic uses, clinical efficacy, and safety attributes. The databases searched in order to obtain scientific literature related to this topic were PubMed and Google Scholar databases. The evidence that is available shows that vonoprazan offers potent and more stable gastric acid suppressions in comparison to the traditional PPIs.