Month: May 2020
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New triple antiviral drug combination for treating COVID-19 in phase 2 randomized trial
A two-week course of antiviral therapy with interferon beta-1b plus lopinavir-ritonavir and ribavirin, started within 7 days of showing COVID-19 symptoms, is safe and more effective at reducing the duration of viral shedding than lopinavir-ritonavir alone in patients with mild to moderate illness, according to the first randomised trial of this triple combination therapy involving…
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FDA approves new heart failure use for AZ’s Farxiga
The FDA has approved a new use for AstraZeneca’s Farxiga (dapagliflozin) to reduce risk of cardiovascular death and hospitalisation with heart failure, in adults with reduced ejection fraction heart failure, with or without type 2 diabetes. AZ is building a metabolic and cardiovascular franchise around Farxiga, which was first approved in type 2 diabetes and was added to the company’s portfolio of drugs after the company…
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Safety alert from TGA on Vitamin B6 (pyridoxine)
Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) has released safety advisory for Vitamin B6, also known as pyridoxine, which is commonly present in multivitamin and mineral preparations, vitamin B complexes, and in combination with magnesium. A known side effect of vitamin B6 is peripheral neuropathy, which has symptoms of tingling, burning or numbness, usually in the hands or…
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Recall of drug used to treat male pattern hair loss
As per FDA alert on Monday, MasterPharm, LLC. is voluntarily recalling 1 lot of drug used to treat male pattern hair loss, Finasteride Plus 1.25mg, capsules to the consumer level. The Finasteride Plus capsules have been found to contain undeclared minoxidil, an antihypertensive drug, at levels greater than those found in FDA approved products. The…
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Immune Checkpoint Inhibitor-Related Cytokine Release Syndrome
Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) have proven effective in the treatment of numerous cancers; however, they have been associated with immune-related adverse events (irAEs), among which cytokine release syndrome (CRS) has been reported in a few case reports. VigiBase database was analysed by researchers and details were published in frontiers pharmacology. Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) have…
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Researchers identify four possible treatments for COVID-19
While COVID-19 has infected millions of people worldwide and killed hundreds of thousands, there is currently no vaccine. In response, researchers have been evaluating the effectiveness of various antiviral drugs as possible COVID-19 treatments. Researchers at the University of Missouri, University of Nebraska Medical Centre, Emory University School of Medicine and Karolinska Institute have found…
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46: The Information Component
The Information Component (IC) is a measure of the strength of the quantitative dependency between specific drug and specific ADR. It is a logarithmic measure of disproportionality used to evaluate strength of association between drug and ADR. It is mathematically expressed as: Where, p (x) is probability of specific drug ‘x’ being listed in a…
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FDA approves emergency use of remdesivir to treat coronavirus
U.S. regulators on Friday allowed emergency use of an experimental drug that appears to help some coronavirus patients recover faster. It is the first drug shown to help fight COVID-19, which has killed more than 230,000 people worldwide. The FDA said in a statement that Gilead Science’s intravenous drug remdesivir would be specifically indicated for…