Generic heart disease medications offer promise for Ebola treatment
2015-06-23
(Press-News.org) Generic medications used frequently in the management of heart disease patients also have the potential to bolster the immune systems of patients with Ebola virus and some other life-threatening illnesses, researchers report this week in mBio®, the online open-access journal of the American Society for Microbiology.
Unlike other medications in development for Ebola, which attack the virus, statins and angiotensin receptor blockers typically used for heart disease work on the host response, or a person's biological reaction to the virus, said lead study author David S. Fedson, MD, a retired professor of medicine at the University of Virginia and expert on influenza and pneumococcal vaccination, and pandemic preparedness. Specifically, the drugs stabilize or restore the integrity of endothelial cells lining the blood vessels. Endothelial cell dysfunction has been a central feature of human Ebola virus disease, he said, leading to severe fluid and mineral losses.
"This approach to Ebola treatment has two advantages," Dr. Fedson said. "First, it uses inexpensive generic drugs that are widely available in any country with a basic healthcare system, and most physicians who treat patients with cardiovascular diseases are familiar with these medications. Second, because this strategy targets the host response to infection, these drugs might be used to treat patients with any form of acute infectious disease in which a failure to overcome endothelial dysfunction could lead to multi-organ failure and death."
The statin/angiotensin receptor blocker combination was found to help improve survival in 100 Ebola patients treated in Sierra Leone, Dr. Fedson said. In a pilot study last fall, patients were given the drugs atorvastatin (40 mg/day) and irbesartan (150 mg/day) at several hospitals in West Africa. While study reports were not published, Dr. Fedson said, reports indicate that rapid clinical improvement was seen in almost all patients. Only two are known to have died: one was critically ill when first seen and died soon after; the other initially responded to three days of combination treatment but relapsed and died when combination treatment was stopped and he was instead given an antiviral agent. The study results need to be replicated, Dr. Fedson said.
When pandemics hit, "you have to have something that ordinary doctors in ordinary countries can use to treat ordinary patients," he said. "We have extraordinary medicines that cardiovascular scientists have developed which modify not just endothelial function but all kinds of things that are part of the host response to infectious disease. In combination they work even better than they do alone."
Treating the host response would not prevent or cure Ebola virus infection itself, Dr. Fedson said, "but it could allow individual patients to survive long enough to develop an immune response that eliminates the virus. These agents could be used in combination with antivirals if they are available."
To move forward, researchers should consider four courses of action, Dr. Fedson said: undertake research on the host response to Ebola virus infection, including involving scientists who understand endothelial cell biology; perform clinical studies in West Africa to test statin and angiotensin receptor blocker combination treatment in Ebola patients; incorporate any successful treatment of the host response in other clinical trials of interventions against Ebola; and recognize the implications of treating the host response for other diseases.
INFORMATION:
mBio® is an open access online journal published by the American Society for Microbiology to make microbiology research broadly accessible. The focus of the journal is on rapid publication of cutting-edge research spanning the entire spectrum of microbiology and related fields. It can be found online at http://mbio.asm.org. The article can be found online at http://mbio.asm.org/content/6/3/e00716-15.
The American Society for Microbiology is the largest single life science society, composed of over 39,000 scientists and health professionals. ASM's mission is to advance the microbiological sciences as a vehicle for understanding life processes and to apply and communicate this knowledge for the improvement of health and environmental and economic well-being worldwide.
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
2015-06-23
URBANA, Ill. -- When grain and other commodity prices experienced explosive episodes between 2004 and 2013, the finger pointed toward index traders as the cause. University of Illinois researchers identified and date-stamped both upward and downward price bubbles for grain during that time period. They found that not only were index traders not to blame but that the bubbles didn't last nearly as long as many thought they did.
"To an economist, a bubble is a period when the price is either above or below its true economic fundamental value, which is determined by the ...
2015-06-23
This news release is available in French. Montreal, 23 June, 2015 -- The United States Department of Defense (DOD) is widely reported to be the single largest consumer of petroleum in the world, spending billions of dollars on fuel every year. While the DOD provides Congress with yearly budget estimates, ongoing conflicts in the Middle East along with a volatile crude oil market have resulted in wide discrepancies between budgeted and actual fuel costs.
New research from Concordia University in Montreal shows that while this perpetual overspending could have serious ...
2015-06-23
Researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have developed a new approach for forming 3D shapes from flat, 2D sheets of graphene, paving the way for future integrated systems of graphene-MEMS hybrid devices and flexible electronics.
"To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first to demonstrate graphene integration to a variety of different microstructured geometries, including pyramids, pillars, domes, inverted pyramids, and the 3D integration of gold nanoparticles (AuNPs)/graphene hybrid structures," explained SungWoo Nam, an assistant professor ...
2015-06-23
Consciousness -- the internal dialogue that seems to govern one's thoughts and actions -- is far less powerful than people believe, serving as a passive conduit rather than an active force that exerts control, according to a new theory proposed by an SF State researcher.
Associate Professor of Psychology Ezequiel Morsella's "Passive Frame Theory" suggests that the conscious mind is like an interpreter helping speakers of different languages communicate.
"The interpreter presents the information but is not the one making any arguments or acting upon the knowledge that ...
2015-06-23
Scientists are expecting that this year's Chesapeake Bay hypoxic low-oxygen zone, also called the "dead zone," will be approximately 1.37 cubic miles - about the volume of 2.3 million Olympic-size swimming pools. While still large, this is 10 percent lower than the long-term average as measured since 1950.
The anoxic portion of the zone, which contains no oxygen at all, is predicted to be 0.27 cubic miles in early summer, growing to 0.28 cubic miles by late summer. Low river flow and low nutrient loading from the Susquehanna River this spring account for the smaller ...
2015-06-23
Milan, Italy - 23 June 2015: The European Society of Cardiology (ESC) has recommended uninterrupted anticoagulation with vitamin K antagonists during ablation and device implantation in a position paper presented today1 at EHRA EUROPACE - CARDIOSTIM 2015 and published in EP Europace.2
'Antithrombotic management in patients undergoing electrophysiology procedures' was produced by the European Heart Rhythm Association (EHRA), a registered branch of the ESC, and is endorsed by the ESC Working Group on Thrombosis, the Heart Rhythm Society (HRS) in the US and the Asia Pacific ...
2015-06-23
This news release is available in French. The presence of multiple BIXI stations within 1 km has contributed to an average increase of 2.7% in sales price of houses nearby
We know that an extra bedroom, and a metro station nearby will make your house more valuable. Now it turns out that a bike-sharing station nearby will do the same.
Researchers at McGill studied house sales in central Montreal before and after the Bixi bike sharing system was launched in Montreal in 2009. They found that a typical home in the central Montreal area they studied had about 12 Bixi stations ...
2015-06-23
Washington, D.C. - June 23, 2015 - Researchers have identified a new class of antifungals to treat the more than 300 million people worldwide who develop serious fungal infections. The research is described in the current issue of mBio, the online open-access journal of the American Society for Microbiology.
"Fungal infections are a significant cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide and current antifungal drugs have drawbacks. These new drugs may pave the way for the development of a new class of antifungals," said principal investigator Maurizio Del Poeta, MD, a ...
2015-06-23
Every time you've seen a plane take off or land at a hub airport, you've seen the world growing more connected, according to a new model developed by researchers at MIT.
In a study published in the journal Transportation Research Part E, the MIT team outlines a model that determines the degree to which regions around the world are connected via air transportation.
The researchers, at MIT's Laboratory for Aviation and the Environment (LAE), analyzed flight schedules between 1990 and 2012 from more than 1,100 airlines connecting over 4,600 airports around the world. ...
2015-06-23
The early diagnosis of certain types of cancer, as well as nervous system diseases such as multiple sclerosis and neuromyelitis optica, may soon be facilitated by the use of a nanometric sensor capable of identifying biomarkers of these pathological conditions.
The nanobiosensor was developed at the Federal University of São Carlos (UFSCar), Sorocaba, in partnership with the São Paulo Federal Institute of Education, Science & Technology (IFSP), Itapetininga, São Paulo State, Brazil. It was originally designed to detect herbicides, heavy metals and other ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
[Press-News.org] Generic heart disease medications offer promise for Ebola treatment
