A new study from Mayo Clinic finds the use of the drug therapy etanercept ineffective in treating alcoholic hepatitis, an acute inflammation of the liver caused by excessive consumption of alcohol. Alcoholic hepatitis is a major cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Severe alcohol-related liver disease carries a poor prognosis. Several research studies have worked to find a successful treatment for alcoholic hepatitis, but no consensus has been reached on the most effective treatment regimen.
Mayo Clinic researchers have shown that patients who were taking statins before a stroke experienced better outcomes and recovery than patients who weren’t on the drug, even when their cholesterol levels were ideal. That finding is reported in the current issue of the Journal of Stoke and Cerebrovascular Diseases. Wyatt Decker, MD discusses the study and its findings.
A pill used for nerve pain offers women relief from hot flashes, Mayo Clinic researchers report at the 45th Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO). They say the agent, pregabalin, decreased hot flash severity and frequency about 20 percent more than did a placebo agent. Thus, pregabalin appears to offer about the same benefit as gabapentin, an older, related drug, as well as newer classes of antidepressants. Hot flashes are a major problem in many women, and for those who opt not to take hormonal therapies or antidepressants, pregabalin appears to be another treatment option, says the studys lead author, Charles Loprinzi, MD, a medical oncologist at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota. While pregabalin offers about the same benefit as gabapentin, women who use it only need to take two pills a day, versus three for gabapentin, he says. Side effects can occur with the use of either drug. However, in this study, they were not severe enough that participants stopped using the active study drug any more often than did patients who were taking placebos, researchers say. Dr. Loprinzi has pioneered the field of nonhormonal hot flash therapy, which he began researching decades ago to help breast cancer patients using tamoxifen, an anti-estrogen treatment that creates symptoms of menopause. He is the first researcher to test the use of antidepressants, compared to placebo treatment, for hot flashes.
