Pharmacology

Just like humans, liver cells love doughnuts, but these are polystyrene ring “doughnuts”, just a few microns across, and they might give scientists a new way to deliver drugs selectively, potentially eliminating nasty side effects of life-saving treatments such as chemotherapy, according to chemists writing in Chemical Communications. Mark Bradley and colleagues at the University of Edinburgh, UK, serendipitously made the polymer doughnuts while studying potential drug-carrying microparticles. While synthesising micro-spheres, the team added a small amount of dioxane to their usual ethanol…

Ritalin, CIBA-Geneva's brand name for methylphenidate, has long been the weapon of choice against rambunctious children (and even used by some who actually have attention deficit hyperactivity disorder - ADHD) so it's no surprise it has become fashionable as "cognition enhancers" by those who like their addictions culturally accepted. Thanks to almost two decades of human experimental trials in the mass population, there is some knowledge of what these drugs actually do in the brain. In a Biological Psychiatry paper, University of Wisconsin-Madison psychology researchers David Devilbiss and…

Freshly released spermatozoids don't just achieve fertilization, they must undergo some changes for this to occur. Among those are changes due to receptors situated in the plasmatic membrane (the layer covering the cells) and opioid and cannabinoid receptors are two of these. On coming into contact with these, physiological reactions are generated in the body which are similar to sedation, analgesia and low blood pressure. According to the research undertaken to date, both substances have an influence on the process of fertilization. It is known that the consumption of external opiates (…

Turmeric, an Asian spice found in many curries, has a long history of use in reducing inflammation, healing wounds and relieving pain, but can it prevent diabetes? Since inflammation plays a big role in many diseases and is believed to be involved in onset of both obesity and Type 2 diabetes, Drew Tortoriello, M.D., an endocrinologist and research scientist at the Naomi Berrie Diabetes Center at Columbia University Medical Center, and his colleagues were curious what effect the herb might have on diabetic mice. Dr. Tortoriello, working with pediatric resident Stuart Weisberg, M.D., Ph.D., and…

Mount Sinai researchers have discovered that polyphenolics derived from red grape seeds may be useful agents to prevent or treat Alzheimer's Disease(AD). This new study explored the possibility of developing 'wine mimetic pills' that would replace the recommended beneficial glass of red wine a day for AD prevention. Giulio Maria Pasinetti, senior author and Director of the NCCAM-NIH funded Center of Excellence for Research in Complementary and Alternative Medicine in Alzheimer's Disease at Mount Sinai School of Medicine and his collaborator Dr. Jun Wang of Mount Sinai, through a partnership…

Wang and colleagues performed a systematic review of safety studies of medical cannabinoids published over the past 40 years and found that short-term use appeared to increase the risk of non-serious adverse events. Of all non-serious adverse events, dizziness was the most common (15.5%). "We found that the rate of non-serious adverse events was 1.86 times higher among medical cannabinoid users than among controls," state the authors. "However, we did not find a higher incidence rate of serious adverse events associated with medical cannabinoid use." The authors note that 99% of the serious…

When smoked, crystal meth rapidly achieves high concentrations in the brain without the burdens of the intravenous route. Stephen J. Kish PhD of the Departments of Psychiatry and Pharmacology, University of Toronto, and the Human Neurochemical Pathology Laboratory, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Toronto, reviews the actions of methamphetamine and explains the potential role of dopamine in methamphetamine craving. Kish states that there is no medication approved for the treatment of relapses of methamphetamine addiction, but potential therapeutic agents targeted to dopamine and non-…

The off-label use of a drug given with RU-486 to terminate a pregnancy may be responsible for a handful of rare, fatal infections seen in women taking the drugs since 2000, a study by University of Michigan scientists suggests. Preliminary U-M studies indicate that oral use of RU-486's companion drug misoprostol is safe, but vaginal use may undermine body's immune responses The drug misoprostol is FDA-approved to be taken by mouth along with RU-486 to end a pregnancy. But many women have received the drug vaginally as part of the two-drug combination, a method of delivery not evaluated by…

Benfotiamine, a popular vitamin supplement is being advertised with claims that are demonstrably untrue, as revealed by research published in the open access journal BMC Pharmacology. Benfotiamine is a synthetic derivative of thiamine (vitamin B1). It is marketed heavily as a dietary supplement using a selection of unsubstantiated, 'not-quite-medical' claims that tend to characterize this field. A large part of this campaign has been built around the belief that benfotiamine is lipid-soluble and, therefore, more physiologically active. Scientific research led by Dr Lucien Bettendorff of the…

An analysis of ongoing randomized clinical trials (RCTs) in diabetes finds that only about 20 percent have as primary outcomes results that patients consider important, such as illness, pain, effect on function and death, according to a new study. Concerns about the safety and efficacy of diabetes interventions continue, in part because RCTs have not measured their effect on patient-important outcomes as quality of life and death, according to background information in the article. "Are future diabetes trials likely to be more informative to patients and clinicians?" the researchers ask.…