HOMOEOPATHIC MEDICINES FOR THE ILL EFFECTS OF ANTIBIOTICS

Antibiotics are a group of medicines that are used to treat infections caused by germs (bacteria and certain parasites). A parasite is a type of germ that needs to live on or in another living being (host). Antibiotics are sometimes called antibacterials or antimicrobials. Antibiotics can be taken by mouth as liquids, tablets, or capsules, or they can be given by injection. Usually, people who need to have an antibiotic by injection are in hospital because they have a severe infection. Antibiotics are also available as creams, ointments, or lotions to apply to the skin to treat certain skin infections.

It is important to remember that antibiotics only work against infections that are caused by bacteria and certain parasites. They do not work against infections that are caused by viruses (for example, the common cold or flu), or fungi (for example, thrush in the mouth or vagina), or fungal infections of the skin.

More or less every drug has side effects because their use disturbs the normal function of the organs of the body and the composition of the blood. The patient may develop disturbances in digestion , discomfort, unsteadiness , diarrhea, sore throat, fever etc. The following medicines may be prescribed  to remove the ill effects of antibiotics. The antibiotics should be stopped when ill effects is noticed

HOMOEOPATHIC MEDICINES

ACIDUM PHOS. 30- For general debility after use of antibiotics

ANTIMONIUM TART. 30- When there is rattling of mucus but little comes up on coughing

BORAX 30—For thrush of tongue and mouth or vagina

BRYONIA ALB 30- Bronchitis with lot of thirst . The patient drinks often and in large quantities. Cough is worse in a warm room and chest is sore.

IPECAUANHA 30-For constant nausea

NITRIC ACID  30—Diarrhea is a very common side effect and it is cured by this remedy

PULSATILLA NIG. 30—Persistent catarrh of the throat and nose

SULPHUR 200-One dose , usually to overcome the so called drug rash

THUJA OCCIDENTALIS 200- It has specific antibacterial action

An Opioid Without Side Effects For Nerve Pain Is That Possible

Today's post is from genengnews.com (see link below). Don't you just love reading an article that contains a sentence like: “Unlike the conventional opioid fentanyl, this agonist showed pH-sensitive binding, heterotrimeric guanine nucleotide–binding protein (G protein) subunit dissociation by fluorescence resonance energy transfer, and adenosine 3′,5′-monophosphate inhibition in vitro.”!! However, with this sort of text, you have to remember that the ordinary neuropathy patient is essentially not the target audience here and this sort of article needs to be read with a sort of 'skim' technique that gives you the gist of what's being said, while skipping over the techno-speak. The article talks about a new form of opioid that is being developed that does the pain-killing job very effectively but doesn't have the side-effects that the media and politicians just can't cope with at the moment. We have to applaud research in the opioid field that doesn't begin with a skull and crossbones declaration that 'all opioids are bad'. Here they are genuinely recognising the benefits of opioids while trying to eliminate the potential harmful side effects. The whole world seems to be searching for opioid alternatives at the moment (powerful lobby - the anti-opioidals!) when the logical thing to search for is opioid adaptations that make them more user-friendly. Worth a read - you'll get the message I promise you.

Opioid Acts Only on Hurt Tissues, Skips Side Effects 
March 6, 2017 Gen News Highlights

  A new opioid can target “disease-specific” (pathological rather than physiological) conformations of receptors and ligands by selectively activating opioid receptors where acidic conditions prevail, as in tissues affected by inflammation or injury. Thus, the opioid brings pain relief at the site of inflammation and does not affect healthy tissues, such as those of the brain or intestinal wall, thereby avoiding side effects. [G. Del Vecchio & V. Spahn/Freepik]

Opioids, like sledgehammers, are powerful but blunt tools. When they are used to flatten pain, opioids may give other things a pounding, too. The problem is conventional opioids act on inflamed or damaged tissues as well as healthy tissues. Consequently, while opioids may relieve pain, they may also cause serious side effects, such as drowsiness, nausea, constipation, and dependency—and in some cases, respiratory arrest.

In hopes of finding a way to craft finer painkilling tools, scientists based at Charité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin scrutinized different ways opioids can interact with opioid receptors. These scientists, led by Prof. Dr. Christoph Stein, were on the lookout for “disease-specific” opioid receptor-ligand conformations. That is, the scientists plan was to exploit pathological (rather than physiological) conformation dynamics in the design of new opioids, and thereby create drugs that would target damaged or inflamed tissues yet bypass healthy tissues.

"By analyzing drug–opioid receptor interactions in damaged tissues, as opposed to healthy tissues, we were hoping to provide useful information for the design of new painkillers without harmful side effects," said Prof. Dr. Stein.

Prof. Dr. Stein’s team was aware that previous strategies in drug development had focused on central opioid receptors in noninjured environments, even though many painful syndromes (such as arthritis, neuropathy, and surgery) are driven by peripheral sensory neurons and are typically accompanied by inflammation with tissue acidosis. Ultimately, the team decided that this alternative mechanism of action—the binding and activation of peripheral opioid receptors—could be preferentially exploited by a new class of opioids. The key was the occurrence of acid conditions.

By following through on this idea, the scientists designed a new opioid that, unlike clinically used opioids, best activates the receptors in acidified tissues. When the new opioid was evaluated in a rat model of inflammatory pain, it exerted strong pain relief essentially without the side effects of standard opioids.

Details appeared March 3 in the journal Science, in an article entitled, “A Nontoxic Pain Killer Designed by Modeling of Pathological Receptor Conformations.” The article describes how the scientists used computer modeling to analyze morphine-like molecules and their interactions with opioid receptors. In particular, computer modeling was used to simulate an increased concentration of protons, thereby mimicking the acidic conditions found in inflamed tissues.

“By computer simulations at low pH, a hallmark of injured tissue, we designed an agonist that, because of its low acid dissociation constant, selectively activates peripheral μ-opioid receptors at the source of pain generation,” wrote the article’s authors. “Unlike the conventional opioid fentanyl, this agonist showed pH-sensitive binding, heterotrimeric guanine nucleotide–binding protein (G protein) subunit dissociation by fluorescence resonance energy transfer, and adenosine 3′,5′-monophosphate inhibition in vitro.”

The authors observed that their novel opioid produced injury-restricted analgesia in rats with different types of inflammatory pain without exhibiting respiratory depression, sedation, constipation, or addiction potential. These results, the authors suggested, mean that treating postoperative and chronic inflammatory pain should now be possible without causing side effects. Doing so would substantially improve patient quality of life.

“In contrast to conventional opioids, our NFEPP-prototype appears to only bind to, and activate, opioid receptors in an acidic environment,” explained the study's first authors, Dr. Viola Spahn and Dr. Giovanna Del Vecchio. “This means it produces pain relief only in injured tissues, and without causing respiratory depression, drowsiness, the risk of dependency, or constipation."

"We were able to show that the protonation of drugs is a key requirement for the activation of opioid receptors," the authors concluded. Their findings, which may also apply to other types of pain, may even find application in other areas of receptor research. Thereby, the benefits of improved drug efficacy and tolerability are not limited to painkillers, but may include other drugs as well.

http://www.genengnews.com/gen-news-highlights/opioid-acts-only-on-hurt-tissues-skips-side-effects/81253978

The Psychological Effects of HIV and Neuropathy

Neuropathy is only mentioned once in this article by the therapist Jim Weinstein, written for 4therapy.com (see link below) but if you substitute the word neuropathy for the letters HIV, you will be able to identify with many of the psychological effects described here. Of course if you're both HIV positive and have neuropathy, you can identify with much of this article on two counts. You may feel that you do well on one psychological reaction but know exactly what he's talking about in the next. It's easy for the patient to underestimate the effects HIV and neuropathy have on the psyche and much easier for the people around him or her. Time to recognise the non-physical effects of disease then because they can sometimes be just as damaging!

Ecstasy, Pain, Anxiety, and Shame--The Psychological Complexities of the HIV+ Man
Jim Weinstein, MBA, MFT

Therapists love to label, to categorize, and to diagnose. It’s a way to reduce the infinite variety of human experience into discreet segments that seem graspable, knowable, and (when necessary) even fixable. It is tempting to oversimplify a short article about the psychological effects of HIV. Yet the truth is that an essential part of understanding HIV’s emotional impact is to recognize that it is as complex as the disease itself.

Accordingly, I’ve decided to list a baker’s dozen of the major issues I’ve encountered in talking with hundreds of HIV positive men over the past decade. These are the variables that determine the unique, personal shape of the disease’s shadow on their lives. I believe that only through the process of understanding and honoring their individual circumstances can that shadow be lifted, and healing occur. In the interest of simplicity, I will be referring primarily to how HIV/AIDS impacts gay men, as they form the bulk of my clinical practice and are also the vast majority of the readers of this publication.

AGE: HIV’s psychological impact can be vastly different on a man in his 20s than on a man in his 40s. For a younger man, the diagnosis is generally much harder to take. Not only does it complicate the "my best years are ahead of me" thinking, but it can feel much more isolating. Older men often find some solace in the memory of friends and lovers who’ve suffered before them, a comfort seldom accessible to the younger guy, who may not know anyone who’s openly positive or who’s died of the disease.

ANXIETY: It’s hard to imagine a condition more anxiety provoking than HIV. In addition to the worries about declining health, bodily deterioration, and the possibility of premature death, there are anxiety-producing situations that someone who’s HIV positive may confront many times on a daily basis: Did I remember to take my pills? How far is the nearest toilet? Should I tell this guy that I’m positive? Not to mention longer-term worries: is my face looking gaunter? If I lose my job, what will I do about medical insurance? Should I worry about planning for retirement?

CAREER: Living with HIV can be devastating to one’s ability to pursue a career, particularly in a fast-paced or stressful field. As men, many of us are raised believing that our worth is measured by what we do for a living, and how successful we are at it. So when someone decides (or is told) that working sixty hours a week has to come to an end, he’s liable to react with despair. Even more common today is the reverse scenario: men who went out on disability or cashed in their life insurance five or ten years ago, counting on living out their last days in relative comfort and peace, only to be faced with the necessity of reentering the work force now that their HIV is under control. But how? How to bring rusty skills up-to-date? How to explain the employment hiatus? Finally, there’s the dilemma of feeling trapped in a job that is no longer fulfilling, but that can’t be left because the insurance benefits are so important.

CHANGE: The single greatest cause of psychological stress is change. In time, people can adapt to almost any circumstance (think of prisoners of war or concentration camp survivors), but the initial period of adjustment is always challenging. Many people with HIV struggle with what seems an almost unending series of changes, not only in their laboratory “markers” (i.e. viral load, T-cell count), or in the fade-in and out of symptoms such as neuropathy, but also in their ability to deal with the volatile side effects of medications – medications that also change as the virus mutates. The only constant in their health picture is their lifelong HIV infection: no cure is in sight, and so they face the eternal, irrevocable sentence: HIV POSITIVE.

COWARDICE: Starting a couple of years ago, the media began promulgating the notion that “the epidemic is over”. After all, thanks to protease inhibitors, death rates had fallen dramatically, hospital wards were empty, and the walking skeletons that used to populate the streets of West Hollywood, the Castro, and Greenwich Village had disappeared. The average American (straight and gay) stopped worrying so much about the AIDS epidemic, and the disease started assuming a more benign face. As a result, someone who’s HIV positive today can feel like a coward for worrying about his health and his life expectancy, particularly if he’s being reassured by friends, family, and maybe even his doctor that HIV is now not such a “big deal”. Yet HIV is a still a very serious and dangerous disease.

DENIAL: For some, the idea of being HIV+ is so frightening or abhorrent that they may act as if they never received a diagnosis. This denial can take various destructive forms: I’ve seen men who only occasionally “partied” with recreational substances suddenly develop a major addiction to smoking crystal. Men who heretofore sexually played safely turn to frequent acts of unsafe/unprotected sex. Or they may delay visiting a doctor until they’re so sick that they have to be hospitalized.

GOD: Living with HIV is at its core an existential dilemma: how to make meaning of an unexpected, unfair twist of fate. Those who can turn to a “higher power”, either through pre-existing belief or through cultivating a spiritual practice (e.g. yoga or meditation) generally fare much better in dealing with their condition than “non-believers”. A not insignificant number of HIV+ men credit their infection with ultimately re-directing their lives in a direction that has given them not only solace and meaning, but even glimpses of (non-pharmaceutical) ecstasy.

GRIEF: Someone who’s HIV positive generally goes into an extended state of mourning, and may experience the loss of many previously wonderful aspects of life: the exuberance of being gay and the celebration of one’s sexuality, the prospect of a future of good health, a general sense of optimism and even immortality. Finding a way to say “goodbye” to these aspects, while finding a place within to cherish their memories, is the key to emerging from the grief and re-engaging in life.

GUILT and SHAME: HIV can foster guilt in a way that a Jewish mother could only envy. “How could I have been so stupid – it’s not like I don’t know how it’s transmitted” is usually where this guilt starts, from which point it may well continue its unrelenting pursuit in various guises. If someone is feeling depressed, yet is relatively healthy, he might be ashamed to voice his feelings: “I shouldn’t complain, after all, so many people are worse off than I am.” If someone has remained relatively healthy for many years, he may feel guilty for having outlived all of those who succumbed earlier. And there’s the question of when, and if, to come out of the HIV closet to family, friends, potential sexual partners and/or casual dates. Unfortunately, but understandably, there will often be a reluctance to turn to friends and family for support, which is the one thing most needed to help heal the psychic pain.

INTERNALIZED HOMOPHOBIA: Having grown up in a society which condemns and even abhors homosexuality (“faggot” is still an acceptable put-down in school), we all carry with us a degree of self-hatred for our attraction to other men. And, in some of us, this self-hatred can be immense (particularly if raised in a fire-and-brimstone Fundamentalist environment, be that Seventh Day Adventist, Southern Baptist, Roman Catholic or Orthodox Jewish). Becoming infected with HIV can re-trigger this self-hatred, magnifying all of those feelings of self-loathing, since it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that “if I hadn’t acted on my sexual impulses I wouldn’t have become infected.”

LOSS OF CONTROL: Most of us labor under the delusion that we’re in control of our life circumstances, a delusion that can be maintained as long as nothing catastrophic occurs. HIV is, to many, that very catastrophe. Suddenly it seems like an alien agent (the HIV virus) is in charge of their lives. The totally powerless feeling that results has been described to me as “like being a passenger in a car on the 405 whose driver just had a heart attack”.

MEDICAL ADVANCES: Ironically, while someone who’s positive is medically much better off today than in the 1980s, it may have actually been easier for some people infected then to deal with the psychological impact of living with HIV. At that time, HIV was almost assuredly a death sentence, and those who were positive were viewed, at least by many in our community, as martyrs or heroes, “diseased” though they might be. That was a context in which fear and suffering could be endured. Today, people who are HIV positive are no longer martyrs or heroes, but they remain “diseased”. And medical advances have enabled many of those infected to look healthy, or even better than before (thanks to testosterone therapy) – even when they’re not feeling that way. So sympathy is harder to come by.

SELF-ESTEEM: “I feel like tainted goods” is a phrase that I hear over and over again when working with HIV+ men. And is it any wonder? In an effort to secure the research and funding attention that was so necessary in the 1980s, AIDS activists promulgated the concept of the disease as a plague. Yet the very success of that effort has left in its wake a tremendous psychological casualty: the already fragile self-esteem of so many gay men has become even further eroded as they discover that they’re liable to be shunned by their peers. Perhaps this facet of living with HIV is best summed up by the short sentence featured in so many Internet profiles and personal ads: “I’m healthy – UB2”. Perhaps an HIV+ guy will never fully fit that bill. But a balanced quest for physical, emotional, and spiritual health can help create a life very much worth living.

"When we say that pleasure is the end, we do not mean the pleasure …of physical enjoyment…(W)e mean the state wherein the body is free from pain and the mind from anxiety." Epicurus (c. 341–271 B.C.), Greek philosopher. letter, Menoeceus 131b, Epicurus Letters, Principal Doctrines, and Vatican Sayings, trans. by Russel M. Geer, Bobbs-Merrill Co. (1964).

About Jim Weinstein...

Jim Weinstein, MBA, MFT, is a life consultant and therapist based in Washington, D.C., with a secondary practice in Beverly Hills, CA, specializing in career counseling, mid-life issues, spiritual counseling, gay and lesbian issues, and more.

http://www.4therapy.com/life-topics/chronic-pain/ecstasy-pain-anxiety-and-shame-psychological-complexities-hiv-man-2415

EFFECTS OF CONSUMING UNNECESSARY ANTIBIOTICS REVEALED

Contrary to popular perception, researchers have found that consuming an unnecessary amount of antibiotics could lead to antibiotic resistance, a major public health concern.

There are other risks associated with taking unnecessary antibiotics, such as secondary infections and allergic reactions, the researchers said.

“Patients figure that taking antibiotics cannot hurt, and just might make them improve,” said David Broniatowski, assistant professor at the George Washington University in the US.

“More than half of the patients we surveyed already knew that antibiotics do not work against viruses, but they still agreed with taking antibiotics just in case,” Broniatowski added.

For the study, the researchers surveyed 113 patients in an urban hospital to test their understanding of antibiotics.

They discovered a widespread misconception: Patients may want antibiotics, even if they are aware that drugs will not improve their viral infection.

These patients believe that taking the medication will not worsen their condition – and that the risk of taking unnecessary antibiotics does not outweigh the possibility that they may help.

“We need to fight fire with fire. We need to let them know that antibiotics can have some pretty bad side effects, and that they will definitely not help cure a viral infection,” Broniatowski said.

The study appeared in the journal Medical Decision Making.

Lyrica Pregabalin Side Effects

Today's post from peoplespharmacy.com (see link below) adds to the ever-growing discussion about Lyrica (pregabalin) as a treatment for nerve pain. It may be worth stating here that in May 2012, the makers Pfizer, withdrew their positive advice for Lyrica, with regard to people with HIV-related or diabetes-related neuropathy. Many doctors across the world have chosen to ignore the hint and continue to prescribe the drug widely for both sorts of neuropathy patient. Like all other treatments for nerve pain it's a drug that can have significant side effects, so it's always worth discussing seriously with your doctor whether it's appropriate for you. Opinions seem to be divided but if Pfizer themselves will not promote their own best-seller for two types of neuropathy, it's certainly worth questioning if it's the right treatment for you. Other articles on Lyrica can be found by looking at the alphabetical list on the right of this blog.

Lyrica Side Effects and Withdrawal are Worrisome
August 1, 2013 in People's Pharmacy Alerts

Have you been seeing the ad blitz for Lyrica (pregabalin)? A LOT of money is being spent trying to convince the American public that Lyrica is the answer to diabetic nerve pain. One of the most compelling commercials stars a retired policeman:

"Hi, I'm terry and I have diabetic nerve pain. I worked a patrol unit for 17 years in the city of Baltimore. When I first started experiencing the pain it's hard to describe because you have a numbness but yet you have the pain like thousands of needles sticking in your foot."

Sounds awful and indeed people with diabetic neuropathy suffer terribly. Symptoms can include:

SYMPTOMS OF DIABETIC NEUROPATHY
Burning, tingling or a feeling of needles sticking into your skin
Numbness in toes and feet; an inability to sense a needle prick; reduced sensitivity to temperature change
Difficulty walking either because of numbness, pain or weakness
Intense stabbing jolts of pain, especially in the evening
Other complications of nerve damage include sexual dysfunction, swallowing difficulties, poor stomach emptying leading to feelings of fullness and bloating, bladder problems and dizziness on standing.

It's hardly any wonder that patients with neuropathy and nerve pain would be looking for help. A commercial like the one with Terry, the retired Baltimore police officer, is very appealing. When Terry says the "pain started subsiding" after taking Lyrica, we imagine that lots of viewers might think that they too might benefit from this drug. Are they paying attention, though, when the voice-over announcer says:

"Lyrica is not for everyone. It may cause serious allergic reactions or suicidal thoughts or actions. Tell your doctor right away if you have these: new or worsening depression or unusual changes in mood or behavior, or swelling, trouble breathing, rash, hives, blisters, changes in eye sight including blurry vision, muscle pain with fever, tired feeling or skin sores from diabetes. Common side effects are dizziness, sleepiness, weight gain, and swelling of hands, legs and feet. Don't drink alcohol while taking Lyrica. Don't drive or use machinery until you know how Lyrica affects you."

While you listen to the on-air announcer speed through this long list of complications you see Terry working in his backyard planting and watering pretty flowers. Somehow, the scary side effects seem less worrisome in such a bucolic setting.

Here are some real stories from our website to bring the side effects into focus:

This comes from LCB:

"I started taking Lyrica 10 days ago for RLS [restless leg syndrome] and fibromyalgia. I was taking gabapentin but it had stopped working. I gained 14 pounds on the gabapentin, and now I've gained 5 pounds more on the Lyrica. I have edema [fluid retention] as well. I'm sleepy for most of the day and I feel like I'm dragging my body around. I have no energy. My husband tells me I'm irritable with the kids, and that I can't seem to remember things anymore.

"All of this is quite a drastic change from my usual energetic, tireless self. I don't like how I feel, and to make the most important point: Lyrica doesn't seem to help much. I still have tons of pain, and RLS at night. So, I have an appointment with my doctor to ask for a change. I believe that these medicines work very well on some people, but we are all so different. It doesn't work for me."

T. had a very scary story to share:

"After almost eight years on Cymbalta, it had lost the effectiveness. My doctor added Lyrica to help with fibro. Soon after, I started to have a deep depression and wanted to end the pain that I have lived with for so long. The stress of life was so great, that I attempted suicide. I was put in the hospital for four days.

"At that point, no more meds! The symptoms are what everyone has described. I feel alone and lost in my own brain fog hell. Not one of my family has a clue what a nightmare this is."

Kathy listed these complicatons:

"I was on the drug eight months for fibromyalgia prescribed by a rheumatologist. I, too, started having problems with eyesight (my eye doctor could NOT update my lenses due to Lyrica causing severe blurriness). I also had memory loss, anxiety, and trouble sleeping. I suffer from chronic constipation due to diverticulitis, and the Lyrica was making this worse. I weaned off over a three-week period. OMG! The withdrawal was/is terrible.

"I am 9 weeks into it, and still have terrible throbbing ongoing headaches, difficulty swallowing, and went from 134 lbs to 118! I feel like I'm dying most of the time. I went to my current neurologist today and was told there were no such symptoms from Lyrica withdrawal!

"Google it, doctor! Please, if anyone reading this is considering taking Lyrica, reconsider! If you have side effects like I did, then decide to go off; you may be looking at a long recovery and NO help from a doctor. They are all denying any problems with this medication. Please read the "Lyrica Withdrawal" posts first!"

Getting off drugs that affect the central nervous system can sometimes be challenging. As we mentioned recently with our post on Abilify, the track record of psychiatry and neurology has been abysmal when it comes to studying sudden withdrawal from commonly prescribed medications. It took years for researchers to discover that when patients suddenly stopped benzodiazepines such as alprazolam (Xanax), diazepam (Valium) or lorazepam (Ativan) they often experienced very unpleasant withdrawal symptoms. Ditto for antidepressants like citalopram (Celexa), duloxetine (Cymbalta), escitalopram (Lexapro), sertraline (Zoloft) and venlafaxine (Effexor).

The story of Lyrica (pregabalin) withdrawal is also murky. There is very little in the medical literature on this topic. The prescribing information does mention, though, that some patients report symptoms such as insomnia, nausea, headache, anxiety, sweating or diarrhea if they stop suddenly. The advice: taper the dose over at least a week rather that stopping suddenly. We fear that such information is not always that helpful, especially since there is not much practical information about actual dosage reduction.


LYRICA SIDE EFFECTS:

Vertigo, dizziness, unsteadiness, coordination problems, abnormal gait
Sleepiness, fatigue
Confusion, abnormal thinking, difficulty with attention and concentration, accidental injury
Dry mouth
Fluid retention in hands or feet, edema
Blurred vision, difficulty with eyesight
Weight gain,
Constipation, gas
Pain
Skin reaction, rash, dermatitis (requires immediate medical attention!)
Depression, suicidal thoughts or actions
Muscle breakdown (rhabdomyolysis), tremor
Blood disorders
Withdrawal symptoms, discontinuation syndrome, seizures

We recognize that some people with hard-to-treat neuropathy or fibromyalgia may do quite well on Lyrica and not suffer side effects. That's great. But some patients don't get much benefit and do suffer complications. For them, Lyrica is not a blessing.

To learn about some other approaches to neuropathy, you may want to check these links about benfotiamine and alpha lipoic acid.

Please share your own story about Lyrica, neuropathy and what has worked or caused problems for you below in the comment section so others can benefit from your experience.

http://www.peoplespharmacy.com/2013/08/01/post-11/

TAKING SHORT WALKING BREAKS FOUND TO REVERSE NEGATIVE EFFECTS OF PROLONGED SITTING

An  Indiana University study has found that three easy -- one could even say slow -- 5-minute walks can reverse harm caused to leg arteries during three hours of prolonged sitting.

Sitting for long periods of time, like many people do daily at their jobs, is associated with risk factors such as higher cholesterol levels and greater waist circumference that can lead to cardiovascular and metabolic disease. When people sit, slack muscles do not contract to effectively pump blood to the heart. Blood can pool in the legs and affect the endothelial function of arteries, or the ability of blood vessels to expand from increased blood flow.

This study is the first experimental evidence of these effects, said Saurabh Thosar, a postdoctoral researcher at Oregon Health & Science University, who led the study as a doctoral candidate at IU's School of Public Health-Bloomington.

"There is plenty of epidemiological evidence linking sitting time to various chronic diseases and linking breaking sitting time to beneficial cardiovascular effects, but there is very little experimental evidence," Thosar said. "We have shown that prolonged sitting impairs endothelial function, which is an early marker of cardiovascular disease, and that breaking sitting time prevents the decline in that function."

The researchers were able to demonstrate that during a three-hour period, the flow-mediated dilation, or the expansion of the arteries as a result of increased blood flow, of the main artery in the legs was impaired by as much as 50 percent after just one hour. The study participants who walked for 5 minutes each hour of sitting saw their arterial function stay the same -- it did not drop throughout the three-hour period. Thosar says it is likely that the increase in muscle activity and blood flow accounts for this.

"American adults sit for approximately eight hours a day," he said. "The impairment in endothelial function is significant after just one hour of sitting. It is interesting to see that light physical activity can help in preventing this impairment."

The study involved 11 non-obese, healthy men between the ages of 20-35 who participated in two randomized trials. In one trial they sat for three hours without moving their legs. Researchers used a blood pressure cuff and ultrasound technology to measure the functionality of the femoral artery at baseline and again at the one-, two- and three-hour mark.

In the second trial, the men sat during a three-hour period but also walked on a treadmill for 5 minutes at a speed of 2 mph at the 30-minute mark, 1.5-hour mark and 2.5-hour mark. Researchers measured the functionality of the femoral artery at the same intervals as in the other trial.

Politics Ignore Side Effects Of Stavudine

Today's post comes from journaids.org (see link below) and the South African newspaper the Mail and Guardian and talks about decisions being made to buy in the antiretroviral drug stavudine (d4T often called Zerit)). It is claimed that low doses of stavudine are just as effective as tenofovir (one of the bases of Truvada) in suppressing the HIV virus. Stavudine is much much cheaper than tenofovir and therefore seems to make sense if the comparison is true, especially in poorer countries in the third world. However the side effects of stavudine are well-documented and neuropathy caused by stavudine makes hundreds of thousands of people's lives a misery. At the end of the short intro is a link to the full article which is shown as a page of the newspaper - makes interesting reading.

Drug row sparked by HIV spending
Mara Kardas Nelson: Mail and Guardian: 12 July 2013

A new study to be conducted in South Africa, Uganda and India has sparked a heated debate in the HIV activist and research community, demonstrating a divide in strategy at the start of the fourth decade of the epidemic.

The debate has sprung from a clinical trial that aims to see whether low-dose stavudine, or d4T, is as effective as tenofovir, or TDF, one of the antiretrovirals (ARVs) currently recommended for first-line HIV treatment by the World Health Organisation (WHO). d4T was long used as the primary first-line therapy but harsh side effects, including neuropathy (nerve damage) and lipodystrophy (abnormal, sometimes disfiguring, fat distribution), led the WHO to recommend against its use in 2011

It is suggested that TDF or zidovudine (AZT) be used instead. But those drugs are relatively expensive: according to the health advocacy organisation, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), d4T is available for as little as $20 (R204) a patient a year, compared with $75 (R764) a patient a year for AZT and $57 (R581) a patient a year for TDF...read the full article

http://www.journaids.org/index.php/blog/blog-entry/drug_row_sparked_by_hiv_spending/