"Health News - Medicine, Diet and Fitness"

AstraZeneca has lodged its appeal over losing the patent for hypertension treatment Toprol XL (metoprolol succinate). In January US court ruled that two patents for the extended release tablet were invalid and unenforceable finding in favour of the defendants KV Pharmaceutical, Andrx Corp and Novartis’s Eon Labs.

The Toprol patent was due to expire in September 2007 and last year US sales for the drug hit $1,291 million. AstraZeneca continues to maintain that both patents are valid and enforceable. The threat of losing patents for anti-ulcerant Nexium and schizophrenia treatment Seroquel is also looming for AstraZeneca, although no court dates have been fixed.

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ROCHESTER, Minn. — Women with at least three sites of cellular atypia in breast tissue are nearly eight times more likely than average women to develop breast cancer, according to findings of a Mayo Clinic Cancer Center-led study of women with atypical hyperplasia. The findings are published in the July 1 issue of the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

Several previous studies have shown that atypical hyperplasia (also called atypia) in breast tissue is a major risk factor for breast cancer. Women who have a breast biopsy and are diagnosed with atypia are considered at high risk. Many are counseled to consider preventive medications such as tamoxifen or other risk-reducing approaches. However, questions remained from prior research on whether a positive family history further increases risk in women with atypia and for how long the increased risk in women with atypia lasts.

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The son of slain physician David Cornbleet, MD, said he will continue to urge the French government to extradite a former patient sought in the killing.

Hans Peterson surrendered to French authorities on the island of St. Martin on Aug. 6 and allegedly confessed to the slaying of the Chicago dermatologist. The late doctor’s family members and two U.S. senators asked the French government to extradite Peterson, but officials rejected the request in late August because Peterson is a French national, said Jon Cornbleet, the doctor’s son.

(Ivanhoe Newswire) — When most people think of underage drinking, they might think about teenagers out for a night of fun.

Think again, report researchers from the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center who combed through mostly unpublished surveys on underage drinking conducted by states and foundations over the past 15 years. Their results suggest kids as young as the fourth grade are consuming alcohol.

Overall, the investigators report 10 percent of fourth graders have already taken their first drink, and seven percent report having drunk alcohol within the past year. The largest increase in the drinking rate occurs between the fifth and sixth grades.

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The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has begun its review of GlaxoSmithKline’s (GSK) investigational antibacterial retapamulin. GSK submitted a new drug application (NDA) for retapamulin in November last year and expects to receive approval later this year.

Retapamulin was developed as a treatment for skin and skin structure infections due to susceptible strains of Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus pyogenes. A GSK spokesman explained the importance of the new antibiotic.

He said: “Continued widespread use of antibiotics has promoted the spread of antibiotic resistance and has created an urgent need for antibacterial agents with no known cross-resistance.” It was explained that retapamulin, the first in a new class of antibiotics called pleuromutilins, is unique in how it works by binding to a particular site of a bacteria and it has so far shown no target-specific cross-resistance to other established classes of antibiotics. The NDA is based on clinical trials of over 700 US patients.

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Cephalon has reported an increase of revenue for 2005 of 19 per cent to $1.2 billion. The firm’s total sales hit $1.16 billion, a rise of 18 per cent on 2004 levels, with the biggest seller being the narcolepsy drug Provigil (modafinil) with sales of $512.8 million. However, despite these figures the company made a loss for the year of $175 million, compared with a loss of $74 million in 2004.

Cephalon chairman and chief executive Frank Baldino said: “Cephalon delivered strong top- and bottom-line growth in 2005. “We also completed a series of acquisitions and collaborations that created a fully integrated oncology business and expanded our business geographically.” He added: “We continued to make progress in our plan to launch five new drugs. Finally, we eliminated uncertainty and added significant upside for our business by settling our litigation over Provigil. As a result, we enter 2006 in a position of strength, poised to deliver our best performance ever.”

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Baltimore – In a survey of more than one thousand infertility patients with frozen embryos, 60 percent of patients report that they are likely to donate their embryos to stem cell research, a level of donation that could result in roughly 2000 to 3000 new embryonic stem cell lines. Researchers from Duke University and Johns Hopkins University report the startling findings in the July 6, 2007 issue of Science.

In August of 2001, less than two dozen embryonic stem cell lines were made eligible for federal research funding. Most scientists now agree that the eligible lines have proven inadequate in number and unsafe for transnational research. Until recently, the best estimate of human embryos currently in storage that might be available for additional stem cell research was three percent. The 2003 study showed that donations would yield, at best, less than 300 new lines.

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Researchers have found that the probability of the breast cancer gene mutation BRCA among women with a history of breast cancer is greater when the number of older, female relatives in the family is smaller, according to a study in the June 20 issue of JAMA. This finding may challenge the accuracy of some breast cancer prediction models, which may not take family structure into account.

“Germline BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene mutations significantly increase a woman’s risk of breast cancer (50 percent - 85 percent) and ovarian cancer (16 percent - 50 percent),” the authors write. “Documented efficacy of screening and risk reduction interventions provides evidence for individualized risk management advice, making genetic cancer risk assessment (GCRA) a component of medically necessary care. Identifying appropriate candidates for GCRA is challenging.”

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Women can safely have DIY abortions at home, a study has concluded. The pilot study, set up by the Department of Health (DoH), found that women less than nine weeks pregnant could safely have the medical abortion outside of hospital.

None of the 172 women, who were given tablets to terminate their pregnancy supervised by a nurse in a health centre, suffered serious complications. Shirley Butler, who managed the pilot project, said: “This has been a successful pilot and it has proved that abortion is safe outside a hospital. “We have had few problems. Some women experienced pain and they were given painkillers. “One woman had haemorrhaging, but if she had been at home she would have called our helpline and she would have been given help.”
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Health secretary Patricia Hewitt yesterday announced details of an allocation of over ?2 billion worth of capital investment in health services over the next financial year. Capital funding is used to acquire and modernise buildings, land and equipment within the NHS and can only be used to fund these aspects.

These allocations represent an increase of almost 20 per cent over 2005-06. A quarter of this is made up in operational capital investment, which goes into NHS trusts and primary care trusts. Mental health trusts are also set to receive a 50 per cent average increase in operational capital compared to the previous financial year. This extra funding is in response to the need for a modernisation of mental health services as the estates are on average older than other parts of the NHS.
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