Category Archives: Drugs

This week, Arena Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: ARNA) announced its application to market its obesity drug lorcaserin in the EU. While I have no idea how that might justify the 35% move we saw in the stock in the two days following, it does seem like lorcaserin might have a slightly better chance at approval there. Lorcaserin, VIVUS' (Nasdaq: VVUS) Qnexa, and Orexigen's (Nasdaq: OREX) Contrave were all rejected by the Food and Drug Administration because the U.S. agency's hard-line stance on the balance of risks and benefits for obesity drugs. When diet and exercise are an option, the bar is set fairly high, although second-round approvals, at least for Qnexa, are looking a little more likely. In the EU, companies have had a much easier time gaining approval for drugs; the two agencies are usually looking at the exact same data, so the only logical explanation is that the European Medicines Agency has a lower threshold for risk-benefit analysis than the FDA. Even with the seemingly easier pathway to approval, there's still a big risk that the EMA doesn't approve lorcaserin or the other obesity drugs. The EMA seems to be taking just as hard a stance as the FDA when … Continue reading →

Targeted medications effective at clearing skin condition Web edition : 9:38 am Two experimental drugs given to patients with psoriasis can clear the skin conditions characteristic thick, dry, red patches at unprecedented rates. The finding paves the way for the long-term clinical trials required for regulatory approval of the medications. By toning down a key immune protein, the drugs wipe out many psoriasis plaques while showing few signs of side effects. Studies of the two drugs appear in the March 29 New England Journal of Medicine. Provided major adverse effects dont turn up in long-term tests, the two medications have a bright future, says Andrew Blauvelt, an immunologist and dermatologist at the Oregon Medical Research Center in Portland. So far, these are looking like great drugs. Craig Leonardi, a dermatologist at the Saint Louis University School of Medicine, was part of both teams that tested the drugs, called ixekizumab and brodalumab. He and other researchers scored the severity of the patients psoriasis based on precise measurements of skin affected by the hallmark red plaques. A successful drug reduces a patients severity score by 75 percent. All volunteers had had moderate to severe psoriasis affecting at least 10 percent of their … Continue reading →

Double gold medallist and anti-drugs campaigner Edwin Moses believes drug cheats should be given a second chance to compete at the Olympics. The former 400m hurdles record holder was in a group of athletes who pushed for tighter testing in the 1980s. But he told BBC Scotland: "Once you serve your penalty, you serve your penalty and you go back to it. "If you go out and drive drunk, you'll get your drivers' licence back eventually. That's much more critical." Scottish cyclist David Millar and English sprinter Dwain Chambers are among those who have been given a lifetime ban by the British Olympic Association. Millar has appealed for a second chance after serving his ban That policy is being considered by the Court of Arbitration for Sport, with the BOA challenging a ruling by the World Anti-Doping Agency that the Olympic ban is unenforceable. But, ahead of a decision expected next month, Moses backs countries like his own who allow those who have tested positive to return to the sport once they have served their ban. "I know, in the United States, our Olympic committee supported LaShawn Merritt, who tested positive a couple of years ago, in his efforts to … Continue reading →

By Carolyn Y. Johnson, Globe Staff Two Boston-area teams have assembled massive encyclopedias that predict the vulnerability of hundreds of different subtypes of cancer to dozens of drugs. The massive catalogs, being made freely available Wednesday, are an important step toward the routine personalizing of cancer care, in which patients will receive treatments tailored to the specific genetic changes that influence a tumors response to drug regimens. Already, the data, which correlate cancer cells genetic profiles with their sensitivity to medications, are being used to design more sophisticated early-stage clinical trials of drugs. The research has also suggested at least one unexpected treatment that can be rapidly tested that a drug used for breast and ovarian cancers may be effective against Ewings sarcoma, a childhood bone cancer. Previous attempts to identify drugs most effective against specific cancers used far fewer tumor types, or cell lines, and the new catalogs more accurately represent the enormous genetic diversity of the disease. This is an invaluable resource, and in fact the term encyclopedia is appropriate. Its a monumental amount of work, which will be useful and used in the years to come, said Dr. Pier Paolo Pandolfi, scientific director of the Beth Israel … Continue reading →

by Alex Ferri - Mar. 27, 2012 09:27 PM The Republic | azcentral.com Despite a new state law that bans certain ingredients used to make a synthetic drug known as "bath salts," manufacturers found a way to tweak their formulas to keep the drug on store shelves. So, legislators are at it again -- this time trying to find a longer-term solution to banning such drugs. The Senate Rules Committee will vote again on House Bill 2388, which would allow the Arizona State Board of Pharmacy to ban the chemicals used in bath salts. The bill failed in the committee Monday over concerns about its constitutionality, but Sen. Linda Gray, R-Phoenix, said at a Tuesday news conference that she expects the bill to pass on its second vote. Gov. Jan Brewer in February signed into law a bill banning seven primary chemicals in bath-salt drugs. But drug manufacturers began to use modified versions of the old chemicals that aren't specifically prohibited by the law, Gray said, a loophole that HB 2388 aims to eliminate. Gray said the Legislature can't always keep up with banning every new substance drug manufacturers use in bath salts because the Legislature isn't always in session … Continue reading →

Of course you know that Ciudad Juarez is a terrifying murder hole, a blood-soaked entry point for drugs into the U.S. from Mexico. It is hell on earth, isn't it? Rival cartels fighting for control of the region kill with impunity and without discretion. Cops? They're hit men. The Federales? Ineffectual at best, complicit at worst. And let us not forget the wave of femicide that's swept through Juarez over the past 15 or so years, leaving thousands of women missing or murdered and dumped wherever was convenient for the men who would never be arrested or charged for their crimes. It's not the kind of place where anyone with half a lick of sense would want to end up. Which is why it's a bit baffling that a hapless sportswriter named Robert Andrew Powell would wash up there a couple years ago, broke, and decide to stay. But, then again, it's cheap, and once Powell gets past the idea that he could be gunned down at any moment, it's really not that bad of a place. With nice people and good food and an astronomically high crime rate and no functioning justice system and one hell of a terrible … Continue reading →

BOSTON (CBS) Many of the drugs paramedics need in life and death situations are in short supply. WBZ has learned some local EMTs are asking permission to use expired drugs because they feel they are better than nothing. We are seeing a rapid rise of shortages of life saving and emergency medications as we have never seen before, said Jonathan Epstein of Northeast Emergency Medical Services. Its getting worse. Epstein oversees emergency medical services in about four dozen facilities north of Boston. He says calls about drug shortages that used to come every couple of months now come daily. One local ambulance company called because they were running out of their third substitute for a drug used to treat seizures. Scenarios like that scare Cathy Rapsas. Her daughter Mary has been transported to the hospital many times due to daily seizures. She would die, says Rapsas. Marys already gone into cardiac arrest once and I just dont want to think about it. Drugs for cardiac emergencies, severe pain, even EpiPens for kids are also in short supply. Sometimes the drugs might be available, but only in different doses, concentrations, or packaging. When a paramedic has to act quickly, those changes … Continue reading →

JERSEYVILLE Illinois authorities' efforts to stem the flow of illegal synthetic drugs continued on Friday with the seizure of 2,700 packets worth an estimated $110,000 from a wholesale company and one of its employees. It was the latest of several rounds of seizures around the state coordinated by Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan in a program called "Operation Smoked Out." Friday's seizures amounted to a major step forward, she said. The seizures in Jerseyville were the firstfroma distributor.Previousseizures were from retail stores. "Cutting off the supply of these extremely dangerous substances at the source is a huge victory," Madigan said in a news release. Acting on an informant's tip, investigators from Madigan's office, Jerseyville police, the Jersey County Sheriff's Department and the South Central Illinois Drug Task Force seized drugs at William F. Brockman Wholesale Tobacco & Candy and at the home of a Brockman employee. Authorities said the company is a supplier to retailers across a large area of central and Southern Illinois. Madigan said the same investigation had resulted in earlier seizures of 177 packages of synthetic drugs from two retailers in Litchfield. No one was arrested in Friday's sweep or previous ones but Madigan spokeswoman Natalie Bauer … Continue reading →

FRIDAY, March 23 (HealthDay News) -- The connections youth have with their teachers may help prevent kids from experimenting with alcohol and drugs at an early age, a new study suggests. The researchers found that students in middle school who felt more emotional support from teachers had a lower risk of early alcohol and illicit drug use. The students defined teacher support as feeling close to a teacher or being able to discuss problems with a teacher. "Our results were surprising," Carolyn McCarty, of Seattle Children's Research Institute, said in an institute news release. "We have known that middle school teachers are important in the lives of young people, but this is the first data-driven study which shows that teacher support is associated with lower levels of early alcohol use." Parental ties also mattered, according to the study. The researchers explained that youth who are close to or who have separation anxiety from their parents may be less susceptible to negative peer influences, including experimentation with risky behavior such as alcohol use. "Teens in general seek new sensations or experiences and they take more risks when they are with peers," said McCarty, who is also a research associate professor at … Continue reading →

A new look at past research suggests that certain drugs used to treat irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) may come with fewer side effects as a price for providing relief. The new findings are based on 26 studies that compared benefits and "harms" of five different drugs used to treat IBS, a condition in which patients experience stomach pain with either diarrhea or constipation. "We do know that a lot of these drugs have side effects," said Dr. Mark Pimentel, the study's lead author and director of the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center's Gastrointestinal Motility Program in Los Angeles. "They've been reported, but we didn't realize how bad it actually was -- specifically in the IBS population." For their study, Pimentel's team looked at the number of patients who need to take a drug before one shows an improvement, and compared that to the number of patients who need to take it before one experiences a side effect. For IBS with diarrhea, Pimentel and his colleagues analyzed past clinical trials of tricyclic antidepressants, a stool slower called alosetron and the antibiotic rifaximin. From 19 studies, the researchers determined that about two people would benefit from tricyclic antidepressants before one patient was harmed, on … Continue reading →