Dipeptidyl peptidase 4 inhibitors increase the concentration of glucagon-like peptide through inhibition of the incretin pathway. These drugs are a valuable addition to currently available oral treatments for type 2 diabetes. The efficacy and safety of the investigational DPP IV inhibitor PF-734200 was evaluated in a phase II, dose-ranging study designed as a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, 12-week trial. PF-734200 was administered as adjunct to ongoing metformin therapy in 301 subjects with type 2 diabetes whose glycemia was inadequately controlled by metformin monotherapy. Evaluations included glycated hemoglobin and mixed meal tolerance tests at baseline and at 12 weeks conducted for a patient subset.
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Yoga Boosts Stress-Busting Hormone 
A condition that predominantly affects women, fibromyalgia is characterized by chronic pain and fatigue; common symptoms include muscle stiffness, sleep disturbances, gastrointestinal discomfort, anxiety and depression. Cortisol is a steroid hormone that is produced and released by the adrenal gland and functions as a component of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis in response to stress. Previous research has found that women with fibromyalgia have lower-than-average cortisol levels, which contributs to pain, fatigue and stress sensitivity.
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Researchers at the Medical University of Vienna have found that the breast of one in two women with lobular breast cancer can be preserved through chemotherapy prior to a breast operation.
“Up until now it had been the view that neoadjuvant chemotherapy hardly had any benefits in cases of lobular breast cancer due to the poor response rate of the cancer, however no one had yet examined the question of the breast preservation rate,” says study leader Prof. Dr. Florian Fitzal from the University Department of Surgery, who also works at MedUni Vienna’s interdisciplinary Breast Centre.
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People teachings concerning this matter may be either borrowed from the older generations, or may be the results of personal researches in this field, based on the study of ones own body. We could however unveil the truth behind many superstitions, beliefs and myths regarding food and healthy eating. These myths may feed upon our fear of disease, which makes us act in a certain way in the desire to protect ourselves.
One such myth is that if you drink too much, it can be tiresome for your kidneys. Its not really like that. Drinking water is an excellent habit which allows us to hydrate ourselves, to diminish any risks of urinary infections and kidney stones. Full Post…
Chaim Bell, of St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto, Canada, and colleagues used medical records for nearly 400,000 elderly people in Ontario to see how often those people left the hospital after a stay there without renewing prescriptions for five long-term medications.
The drugs included cholesterol-lowering statins, blood thinners, and asthma inhalers.
“These are people that have been identified to have a disease and have been appropriately treated with evidence-based treatment for that disease. So these are success stories,” Bell said.
“After hospitalizations they are no longer on these medications, and that’s a shame.”
In a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the researchers then compared those who’d been admitted to a hospital with those who hadn’t over the period from 1997 to 2009.
For
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The Food and Drug Administration has approved a new Pfizer drug for a subset of lung cancer patients with a particular genetic mutation.
The twiceaday pill, called Xalkori, is part of a new wave of personalized medications that fight disease by targeting specific genes found in certain patients. Last week, the FDA approved another drug that uses similar gene targeting technology to treat two rare forms of lymph node cancer.
Xalkori is approved to treat a small subset of nonsmall cell lung cancer patients, less than 7 percent, who have an abnormal gene that stimulates cancer cells and causes tumor growth. It works by blocking proteins produced by the gene.
“It’s another example of how we’re using molecular medicine to subtype lung cancer into more specific and treatable diseases,” said Dr. Full Post…
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