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When the administration of inhaled corticosteroids is not sufficient to control asthma symptoms, guidelines suggest the increase in cortisone dose or the adding of a long-acting beta-agonist, while anticholinergic drugs are first-choice drugs in patients with COPD. So, researchers have wondered whether these last products can obtain some benefits also in asthma: with a double-blinded, randomized trial, sponsored by NIH, with a crossover, 210 adults with asthma non-controlled by the usual therapy, treated with inhaled beclometasone (80 μg twice a day), have been treated in sequence with the adding of salmeterol, then with the adding of an anticholinergic (tiotropium) or with a double cortisone dose.
MedNews (Pharmacology) - Mon, 23 January 2012
http://mn.medsurfnews.com/
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In 2009, in the USA, the use of milnacipram (a selective serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor) was approved for the treatment of fibromyalgia. With a trial sponsored by pharmaceutical industry, 1025 patients affected by this disease for an average period of 11 years have been treated with milnacipram or placebo.
MedNews (Pharmacology) - Mon, 9 January 2012
http://mn.medsurfnews.com/
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Weight loss is fundamental for the prevention of cardiovascular events, so trials to find effective solutions to overweight and obesity are more and more frequently performed. In this trial, sponsored by pharmaceutical industry, over 10,000 subjects with an excess of weight and with known cardiovascular risk factors or with type 2 diabetes and at least another risk factor have been collected.
MedNews (Pharmacology) - Mon, 21 November 2011
http://mn.medsurfnews.com/
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In the equipment of drugs to obtain a weight loss, there are some products which really produce a weight loss but which are not used for this reason because of their heavy side effects, such as, for example, rimonabant (an antagonist of cannabinoid receptors, recently retired from the market) and, partly, sibutramine.
MedNews (Pharmacology) - Mon, 21 November 2011
http://mn.medsurfnews.com/
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Over the past 12 months, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved 35 new medicines. This is among the highest number of approvals in the past decade, surpassed only by 2009 (37). Many of the drugs are important advances for patients, including: two new treatments for hepatitis C; a drug for late-stage prostate cancer; the first new drug for Hodgkin’s lymphoma in 30 years; and the first new drug for lupus in 50 years.
Food and Drug Administration (Pharmacology) - Mon, 7 November 2011
http://www.fda.gov
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The use of drugs interfering with the rennin-angiotensin system has become wider and wider, in recent years, with the marketing of ACE-inhibitors before and of ARB (sartans) afterwards. With such a high number it is easy to discover the birth of new interactions between drugs. Knowing that hyperkaliemia has been associated with the use of ACE-inhibitors and trimethoprim, a case-control trial has been performed in Toronto among subjects ≥ 66 years of age under continuative treatment with drugs inhibiting rennin-angiotensin system and administered with an antibiotic.
MedNews (Pharmacology) - Mon, 10 October 2011
http://mn.medsurfnews.com/
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Researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have paired up medicines and maladies with help from a molecular “Match.com.” When the scientists applied an “opposites attract” algorithm to publicly available databases, surprising sparks flew: They found potential compatibilities between numerous existing drugs and diseases for which those drugs had never before been thought to be beneficial.
Stanford School of Medicine (Pharmacology) - Tue, 6 September 2011
http://med.stanford.edu
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With a trial based on the English QResearch database, over 2 million subjects between 30 and 84 years of age have been examined; out of these, about 225,000 had recently been under continuative therapy with statins: 160,000 with simvastatin, 50,000 with atorvastatin and 15,000 with pravastatin, rosuvastatin or fluvastatin. The use of statins was associated, in a statistically significant way, with a lower risk of esophageal cancer, but with a higher risk of liver disease (an increase in ALT of about three times higher than the normal value), of myopathy (discovered clinically or through CK levels measurement four times higher than the highest normal value), of acute renal failure and cataract.
MedNews (Pharmacology) - Mon, 11 July 2011
http://mn.medsurfnews.com/
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According to recent trials, we know that the efficacy of clopidogrel is decreased by the contemporary assumption of protonic pump inhibitors (PPIs) because of the interference with the activity of cytochrome CYP2C19. In this retrospective trial, the risk of a new hospitalization for infarction or for coronary stent positioning has been assessed in 2066 patients (averagely 69 years of age) discharged after infarction or coronary revascularization. About half of the subjects had been treated with clopidogrel alone and the other half with a contemporary assumption of a PPI.
MedNews (Pharmacology) - Mon, 27 June 2011
http://mn.medsurfnews.com/
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The aim of this guideline is to provide guidance on the clinical development of compounds for the treatment of cystic fibrosis, a systemic chronically debilitating disease, mainly paediatric up to now, with a regularly increasing adult population as life expectancy improves (47% adults in 2006 according to ECFS, mean-aged 16-22 yrs).
EMEA - European Medicines Agency (Pharmacology) - Tue, 17 May 2011
http://www.ema.europa.eu