Using Muffins To Detect Diabetes

October 31st, 2011 by Ryan Luce No Comments

written by Michael O’Leary

“Fast all night and eat a muffin in the morning,” might be your doctor’s orders for testing whether you have type 2 diabetes someday according to researchers at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York.

That’s what a subset of 73 women taking part in a menopausal hormone therapy trial, were told after a 10-hour fasting blood draw to assess their two-hour glucose levels. (Link to published site)

COPD Detection Adds More Bang to CT Screening for Lung Cancer

Adding a short, low-dose sequence to a CT scan for lung cancer proved useful in identifying current and former heavy smokers with asymptomatic chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), a new Dutch study shows.

(Video courtesy of the Journal of the American Medical Association)

While the 2010 US National Lung Screening Trial (NLST) proved that using CT scans to diagnose lung cancer in heavy smokers reduced deaths by 20 percent compared to conventional x-rays, questions about the cost-effectiveness of doing so remain. Whether adding the ability to diagnose COPD in these patients tips the balance in favor of CT screening in this population is unclear. The study appears in the Oct. 26, 2011 Journal of the American Medical Association. (Link to published site)

Does Raising Your HDL Cholesterol Really Help?

October 26th, 2011  

written by Michael O'Leary

Dr. Gregory Nichols

Type 2 diabetics know they have a significantly higher risk for coronary artery disease that can lead to heart attacks and hospitalization. There has been tremendous progress in heading off these heart attacks using LDL cholesterol-lowering medications. The evidence is growing, however, that raising HDL cholesterol may double the benefits in both lowering LDL cholesterol and reducing hospitalizations due to cardiovascular disease.

That’s the finding of a large study conducted by Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research in Portland, Ore. as reported by MedPage Today. The researchers found that for every increase of 5 milligrams of HDL cholesterol per deciliter (mg/dL) of blood there was a 6 percent reduction in hospitalization due to cardiovascular disease. (Link to published site)

Byetta Can Now Officially Be Used With Lantus

written by Michael O'Leary

Adult type 2 diabetes patients who use insulin have a new option for controlling their blood glucose.

Amylin Pharmaceuticals, Inc., and Eli Lilly and Company announced Oct. 19, that the FDA has approved a new use for BYETTA® (exenatide) injection. The drug can now be used by those using the insulin glargine (Lantus®) with or without metformin and or thiazolidinedione and still haven’t achieved control of their blood sugar.

Dr. Christian Weyer, senior vice president, research and development at Amylin said this marks an important new option for the 60 percent of type 2 diabetes patients who haven’t been able to reach their target blood sugar levels. (Link to published site)

MRI Offers Powerful Research Tool for Assessing Lipid-Lowering Therapy

MRI scans might give researchers a powerful new tool for monitoring the effectiveness of lipid therapies for coronary or carotid artery disease, a new study shows.

Led by Dr. Xue-Qiao Zhao, of the University of Washington, Seattle, the researchers sought to determine if cholesterol-lowering drugs deplete plaque lipid content. Zhao told the Hub by e-mail that they used MRI as a tool to make direct assessment of the plaque tissue composition during treatment. The study appears in the October issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology: Cardiovascular Imaging. (Link to published site)

“I got this powdered water – now I don’t know what to add” – Steven Wright

written by Michael O’Leary

H2O might lower your risk of a rising A1c depending on how much you drink each day.

A nine-year study of 3,615 middle-aged, French men and women with normal fasting blood glucose levels at the start of the study showed that the risk of developing excessive blood sugar levels decreased the more water people drank. (Link to published site)

Diabetes Is Yet Another Disease Cured! (In Mice…)

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2011

written by Michael O’Leary

The day when you take a pill to prevent or reverse type 2 diabetes may be a step closer, but clinical testing of the new, promising drug is still a few years away according to new research published yesterday.

Researchers have restored normal blood sugar control in mice with type 2 diabetes and the finding suggests it may be possible for people some day too. (Link to published site)

Does Actos Reduce Stroke Risk?

written by Michael O’Leary

Not to be outdone by upstart Juvisync, a new study shows that long-time type 2 diabetes drug, Actos, may also have blood vessel benefits.

The small study of 52 type 2 diabetes patients, published in the October Journal of the American College of Cardiology found that patients taking pioglitazone (Actos) had reduced inflammation associated with plaque deposits in the main arteries serving the head and neck. Such deposits are thought to increase the risk of stroke. (Link to published site)

MRI Mismatch may Identify Stroke Patients within Critical Treatment Window

A number of MRI techniques have been 

considered as a means for identifying 

elapsed time from stroke onset. (MRI 

angiogram courtesy of Wikipedia.)

A mismatch in the images produced by two different MRI techniques of patients experiencing a stroke are likely to indicate that patients are candidates for intravenous thrombolysis, a new study shows.

The study, led by Dr. Götz Thomalla, of the Universitätsklinikum Hamburg-Eppendorf, Germany, adds to the growing evidence that diffusion-weighted (DWI) MRI and fluid-attenuated inversion recovery (FLAIR) MRI may be useful for identifying patients who are within the 4.5 hour window when thrombolytic therapy is beneficial. The study is online ahead of print publication in October, The Lancet Neurology. (Link to published site)

You Got Your Januvia in My Zocor! (Introducing Juvisync)

written by Michael O’Leary

Precursor to Juvisync?

If you have type 2 diabetes and take several medications each day, FDA approval of a the first combination drug that both lowers blood sugar and cholesterol is good news.

Juvisync combines the active ingredients of Januvia (sitagliptin) and Zocor (simvastatin).

“This is the first product to combine a type 2 diabetes drug with a cholesterol lowering drug in one tablet,” said Dr. Mary H. Parks, (Link to published site)

Breast Imaging Market Resumes Steady Growth

October 7, 2011

Replacement of these older analog mammography
machines in part has fueled growth of the breast
imaging device market. (Photo courtesy of
National Institutes of Health)

The market for breast imaging devices is expected to recover and continue growing at compound annual growth rate of 10 percent, reaching over $1 billion by 2017, a market analysis shows.

The report prepared by iData Research observes that a strong trend for faster, higher quality imaging has resulted in an almost entire replacement of older analog mammography with more advanced systems.  In addition, emergence of breast-specific gamma imaging (BSGI) as a supplement to mammography and ultrasound is the fastest growing segment of the breast imaging market. Together they form the basis of a projected double-digit growth of the market. (Link to published site)

More Frequent Doctor Visits Helps Your Blood Sugar

October 3rd, 2011

written by Michael O’Leary

Dr. Alexander Turchin

A doctor a day keeps the blood glucose at bay. Well not quite, but a new study of medical records shows that people with diabetes who visited their doctors every two weeks got their blood sugar, blood pressure and cholesterol under control much sooner than patients who saw their doctors at three to six month intervals.

The research team led by Dr. Alexander Turchin, of Boston’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital analyzed the electronic medical records of 26,496 people at their institution and at Massachusetts General Hospital. All patients had either type 1 or type 2 diabetes with at least one measure of health above the recommend goals. The targets were hemoglobin A1c under 7 percent, blood pressure under 130/85 mm Hg, and LDL cholesterol under 100 mg/dL. (Link to published site)