Researchers in separate clinical trials found two drugs slow the progression of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, a fatal lung disease with no effective treatment or cure, and for which there is currently no therapy approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
A vaccine or other therapy directed at a single site on a surface protein of HIV could in principle neutralize nearly all strains of the virus—thanks to the diversity of targets the site presents to the human immune system.
Mice severely disabled by a condition similar to multiple sclerosis (MS) were able to walk less than two weeks following treatment with human neural stem cells. The finding, which uncovers potential new avenues for treating MS, will be published online on May 15, 2014, in the journal Stem Cell Reports.
A University of Pennsylvania researcher has discovered that the common selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) citalopram arrested the growth of amyloid beta, a peptide in the brain that clusters in plaques that are thought to trigger the development of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Penn, in collaboration with investigators at Washington University, tested the drug’s effects on the brain interstitial fluid (ISF) in plaque-bearing mice and the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of healthy human subjects to draw its conclusions, which are detailed in the new issue of Science Translational Medicine.
A commonly prescribed antidepressant can reduce production of the main ingredient in Alzheimer’s brain plaques, according to new research at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and the University of Pennsylvania.
Feeling sluggish? Gaining weight? What you need is a shot in the arm, claim advertisers for trendy vitamin B12 injections.Don’t let marketers needle you.“If medical testing confirms that an individual has a vitamin B12 deficiency, a vitamin B12 supplement will help. But if a B12 deficiency has not been identified by a physician or primary care doctor, there is no need to waste energy and money on B12 shots,” says Ashley Barrient, clinical dietitian, Loyola Center for Metabolic Surgery & Bariatric Care.
A new study by researchers at the Intermountain Medical Center Heart Institute in Salt Lake City has found that atrial fibrillation patients who are on blood thinning medications are at higher risk of developing dementia if their doses are not in the optimal recommended range.
Osteosarcoma is the most common bone tumor among children and young adults, with about 400 cases diagnosed in the United States each year, with five-year survival rates between 50 and 60 percent. With the help of dogs, researchers at the University of Kansas Cancer Center, Children's Mercy and Colorado State University will screen thousands of drugs in a new project that seeks to improve the treatment of this rare bone cancer in humans and dogs alike.
By linking cancer gene expression patterns with drug activity, a research team from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center finds a possible cancer therapy hidden in an antimicrobial agent.
In most circumstances, extremely premature babies should not be given a drug to prevent a potentially fatal fungal infection, according to findings by a Duke Medicine-led research team.
-- Men who begin taking statins after prostate cancer surgery are less likely to have a recurrence of their cancer, according to a retrospective analysis led by researchers at Duke Medicine.
Tests of a new long-acting version of one of the oldest multiple sclerosis (MS) drugs on the market show it worked significantly better than placebo in reducing the number of patient relapses and developments of new or active lesions, researchers report. Most important, they add, the updated version was effective even though injections were given every two weeks instead of every other day, and it appears that fewer patients develop resistance to it.
Pregnancy affects how drugs are metabolized, which makes it difficult for physicians to prescribe appropriate dosing. A research team at the University of Illinois at Chicago has revealed new details about one particular enzyme that’s responsible for the metabolism of one-fifth of drugs on the market.
A unique, noninvasive method measures the disassembly of biodegradable nanoparticles that can be used to deliver medicines to patients. The technique is a necessary stop in translating nanoparticles into clinical use.
Two new studies may offer hope for people with migraine. The two studies released today will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology’s 66th Annual Meeting in Philadelphia, April 26 to May 3, 2014.
A study demonstrated that hospitals participating in a national quality-improvement program have markedly increased the speed with which they treat stroke patients with the clot-busting drug. This speedier treatment was accompanied by reduced mortality, fewer treatment complications and a greater likelihood that patients would go home after leaving the hospital instead of being referred to a skilled nursing facility.
Based on results of a clinical trial led by Dana-Farber Cancer Institute scientists, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the first targeted drug as treatment for advanced stomach cancer.
Ginseng can help treat and prevent influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), a respiratory virus that infects the lungs and breathing passages, according to research findings by a scientist in Georgia State University’s new Institute for Biomedical Sciences.
A new approach to handling agitation, aggression and other unwanted behaviors by people with dementia may help reduce the use of antipsychotics and other psychiatric drugs in this population, and make life easier for them and their caregivers.
The drug sirolimus can slow the lung disease LAM, while also causing potentially fatal complications after lung transplants. But research suggests a drug similar to sirolimus may be safe for LAM patients waiting for transplants.
A novel antiviral drug may reduce the spread and severity of measles without a vaccination. Dr. Richard Plemper from the Institute for Biomedical Sciences at Georgia State University and Dr. Michael Natchus of the Emory Institute for Drug Discovery (EIDD) will be available to answer questions from the media at a live virtual press conference at 1 PM EDT, Wednesday, April 16th.
A novel antiviral drug may protect people infected with the measles from getting sick and prevent them from spreading the virus to others, an international team of researchers says.
The next nationwide medication disposal day is Saturday, April 26, from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m.
In a study of nearly 1,000 mother-child pairs, researchers from the Bloomberg School of Public health found that prenatal exposure to selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), a frequently prescribed treatment for depression, anxiety and other disorders, was associated with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and developmental delays (DD) in boys. The study, published in the online edition of Pediatrics, analyzed data from large samples of ASD and DD cases, and population-based controls, where a uniform protocol was implemented to confirm ASD and DD diagnoses by trained clinicians using validated standardized instruments.
For patients undergoing surgery, adding a sedative drug called dexmedetomidine can reduce the necessary doses of other anesthetic drugs, reports a study in the April issue of Anesthesia & Analgesia, official journal of the International Anesthesia Research Society (IARS).
Researchers have found that women on antidepressants are more successful at breastfeeding their babies if they keep taking the medication.
Pharmacist-patient telephone consultations appear to reduce hospitalizations in patients who are least at risk, finds a new study in Health Services Research.
Koch Institute researchers have developed a novel mouse model of anaplastic thyroid cancer and identified a combination of targeted therapies that shrinks these tumors
Researchers from the University of California, San Diego Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, in collaboration with materials scientists, engineers and neurobiologists, have discovered a new mechanism for using light to activate drug-delivering nanoparticles and other targeted therapeutic substances inside the body.
Johns Hopkins researchers say that an experimental anticancer compound appears to have reversed behaviors associated with schizophrenia and restored some lost brain cell function in adolescent mice with a rodent version of the devastating mental illness.
Tweaking a specific cell type’s ability to absorb potassium in the brain improved walking and prolonged survival in a mouse model of Huntington’s disease, reports a UCLA study in Nature Neuroscience. The discovery could point to new drug targets for treating the devastating disease, which strikes one in every 20,000 Americans.
Rheumatology expert is available to offer commentary about the recent FDA public meeting on fibromyalgia (FM), including shortcomings in the current treatment paradigm for people with FM, why focusing on sleep quality could be the key to better treatment and what advances are being made on the frontiers of research today.
A new guideline from the American Academy of Neurology suggests that there is little evidence that most complementary or alternative medicine therapies (CAM) treat the symptoms of multiple sclerosis (MS). However, the guideline states the CAM therapies oral cannabis, or medical marijuana pills, and oral medical marijuana spray may ease patients’ reported symptoms of spasticity, pain related to spasticity and frequent urination in multiple sclerosis (MS). The guideline, which is published in the March 25, 2014, print issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology, states that there is not enough evidence to show whether smoking marijuana is helpful in treating MS symptoms.
A new microfluidic method for evaluating drugs commonly used for preventing heart attacks has found that while aspirin can prevent dangerous blood clots in some at-risk patients, it may not be effective in all patients with narrowed arteries. The study, which involved 14 human subjects, used a device that simulated blood flowing through narrowed coronary arteries to assess effects of anti-clotting drugs.
By shifting evolution into reverse, it may be possible to use “green chemistry” to make a number of costly synthetic drugs as easily and cheaply as brewing beer.
The Institute for Research in Immunology and Cancer (IRIC) at the Université de Montréal (UdeM), in collaboration with the Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital’s Quebec Leukemia Cell Bank, recently achieved a significant breakthrough thanks to the laboratory growth of leukemic stem cells, which will speed up the development of new cancer drugs.
Scientists at Whitehead Institute have pinpointed a major mitochondrial pathway that imbues cancer cells with the ability to survive in low-glucose environments. By identifying cancer cells with defects in this pathway or with impaired glucose utilization, the scientists can predict which tumors will be sensitive to these anti-diabetic drugs known to inhibit this pathway.
Patient requests for specific medications—including requests for brand-name drugs spurred by direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising—have a substantial impact on doctors' prescribing decisions, suggests a study in the April issue of Medical Care. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health.
Chemists at The Scripps Research Institute have devised a greatly improved technique for making amino acids not found in nature. These “unnatural” amino acids traditionally have been very difficult to synthesize, but are sought after by the pharmaceutical industry for their potential medical uses.
A study led by UC San Diego shows that emotions can spread in an online social network -- and that positive emotion spreads more than negative.
Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute have developed a method for modifying organic molecules that significantly expands the possibilities for developing new pharmaceuticals and improving old ones.
University of Utah chemists discovered how vibrations in chemical bonds can be used to predict chemical reactions and thus design better catalysts to speed reactions that make medicines, industrial products and new materials.
Patrizia Cazzaniga had heard the horror stories about early treatments for hepatitis C – multiple daily pills and weekly shots for up to a year, side effects that could be debilitating, and a cure rate of only about 40 percent.
Kinases are proteins that play vital roles in disease, but scientists have struggled to study how they interact in real time. The lab of UNC's Klaus Hahn has developed a new technique to make these interactions occur and then watch them in real time to reveal some underlying causes of metastasis.
Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have discovered that FDA-approved anti-psychotic drugs possess tumor-killing activity against the most aggressive form of primary brain cancer, glioblastoma.
Innovative methods of drug discovery don’t always take place in an academic laboratory. They may start there, but they can also happen in orbit aboard the International Space Station, as protein crystallization research from UAB is about to demonstrate once again.
Total spending on prescription medications has been declining for several years, but that trend is expected to reverse and rise 3 to 5 percent for 2014, according to a new report by a team led by the University of Illinois at Chicago’s Center for Pharmacoepidemiology and Pharmacoeconomic Research.
Washington University in St Louis chemist Timothy Wencewicz says we’ll stay ahead of antibiotic resistance only if we find drugs with new scaffolds, or core chemical structures. One promising candidate, an antibiotic made by a bacterium than infects plants, caught his attention because it contains an “enchanted ring,” the beta-lactam ring that is found in penicillin and the cephalosporins. In this case, however, it acts against a different target than the beta-lactams.
Costs for medications are expected to rise by 3 - 5% in all health care settings in 2014, according to a report published by the American Journal of Health-System Pharmacy (AJHP). This annual projection of drug expenditures helps hospitals and health-systems plan drug budgets, which are a significant operating expense.
Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute have invented small-molecule folding probes that enable them to quantify functional, normally folded and disease-associated misfolded conformations (shapes) of a protein-of-interest in cells under different conditions.
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