Thursday, September 6, 2012
Problems Associated with Wearing Contact Lenses
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
AIDS Drugs Patent Pool Opens Easy Access for Poor Patients
Led by Gilead Sciences, the largest maker of HIV drugs, the Medicine Patent Pool expects to get other big drug makers to also sign-up. It is looking forward for get ViiV Healthcare, Squibb, Roche, Boehringer Ingelheim, Sequoia Pharmaceuticals, and more. If the patent pool gets the same deal from these drug makers, even the poorest among the 33 million HIV positive individuals will be able to afford AIDS medicines. It will create the kind of system that grants license technology to the patent holders, authorizing them to manufacture cheap generics, with modest royalties as payment.
With the existence of cheaper and more generics AIDS drugs, the flow of necessary medication to different poor countries across the horizon will become faster. Big pharmacies will get very little royalties especially in African countries, wherein generics drugs fall only at 1 or 2 percent of those in developed or high-income countries. It will be like a big uniform discount for usually high-priced branded products. But with such a sacrifice and success of the pool, poor countries can have an estimated savings of $1 billion annual drug spending.
Generic copies of tenofovir, emtricitabine, as well as the upcoming cobicistat, elvitegravir, and Quad were allowed by Gilead. Quad, in particular, is the combination of the different AIDS treatment drugs.
UNITAID, a health financing system, launched the medicine patent pool. And the U.S. National Institutes of Health was the first to sign-up in the pool in September, which was recently followed by Gilead Sciences.
This patent pool will not only benefit HIV patients, but also the health care industry in the said countries that have long been struggling with the high HIV infection rate as well as AIDS mortality rate and related deaths.
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
H1N1 Deaths Climb in Greece
Friday, October 8, 2010
New Vaccine Extends Survival on Aggressive Brain Cancer Patients
Long dark night sure ends to let light shine, and this is also true for glioblastoma sufferers. In their relentless efforts to find cure for this aggressive brain cancer, medical scientists at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center and Duke University Medical Center proved to be just the right people in lab coats, having found a vaccine that extends survival on glioblastoma patients.
The study, which was published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, the vaccine acts by blocking EGFRvIII, a growth factor that fuels the brain cancer’s aggressiveness. The new EGFRvIII vaccine eliminates cancer cells that carry the said cancer marker, thus extending patient survival with a longer progression-free period.
According to Darell D. Bigner, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Preston Robert Tisch Brain Tumor Cente and the senior of the study, “About a third of all glioblastomas are fueled by a very aggressive cancer gene, called EGFRvIII; these tumors are the “worst of the worst.” Our study showed that the vaccine eliminated all of the cancer cells carrying this marker in all but one of our study participants.”
The study had 18 participants who were all recently diagnosed with glioblastomas. Their conditions were compared to that of 17 other control patients. Both groups have undergone surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy. A month after receiving radiation therapy, the vaccine group were started receiving the injections and were given it for as long the treatment proves to have effect on them. The control group continued to receive the same treatments but without the vaccine.
EGFRvIII vaccine or peptide vaccine allowed the vaccine group to experience median survival time of 26 months, while those in the control group who did not receive the injections only survived 15 months. Average progression-free survival for the vaccine group was 14.2 months, while the other group only 6.3 months.
While EGFRvIII vaccine provided just an extended survival, future advent discoveries might provide cure. Night can be long, but when we see the dawn coming, we know the bright noon will follow. In the meantime, medical scientists also wear the nursing shoes to closely look into what needs to be done with glioblastoma patients.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Multiple Sclerosis Sufferers Got New FDA Approved Relapse Pill
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Fingolimod or Gilenya works b reducing the circulation and the penetration into the brains of immune cells, which cause inflammatory damage to the brain cells as well as to the fatty sheaths protecting the connections between them. This means reduced risk of progressively disabling mobility and cognition problems caused by brain lesions due to episodes of inflammation.
Before taking the medication, multiple sclerosis patients need to know three of Gilenya’s serious side effects. If any of the following symptoms are experienced, call your trusted man in lab coats.
Gilenya can cause slow heart rate.
Symptoms include dizziness, tiredness, and slow or irregular heart beat. These can be experienced within the six hours after taking the first dose. In around one month, heart rate should go back to normal.
Gilenya can increase risk of infections.
Symptoms include fever, tiredness, body aches, chills, nausea and vomiting. The drug increases risk of infections because it lowers the number of lymphocytes or white blood cells in the blood, but will go back to normal within 2 months after stopping treatment.
Gilenya can cause blurred vision called macular edema.
Symptoms include blurriness or shadows in the center of the vision, blind spot in the center of the vision, sensitivity to lights, and unusually colored or tinted vision. These symptoms are similar to MS attack’s optic neuritis, and can surface after 3 to 4 months of starting with the medication. Diabetic people have higher risk.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Painless Vaccines Can Be Available in the Future
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The group tested the new technological development on groups of mice. The microneedles, loaded with influenza vaccine, one group of mice was patched, while another group received the drug through traditional hypodermic needles. After which they were with flu virus. At the end of three months, the tests showed patched created a more effective immune response on mice.
This promising new