Epilepsy Drug Studied for Home Use
The drug Diastat can be safely given to children and adults at home to stop clusters of epileptic seizures, according to Dr. Wendy Mitchell of the USC School of Medicine. Repetitive seizures can develop into status epilepticus, a life-threatening condition that can result in severe brain damage or even death. These patients are now generally taken to emergency rooms for treatment, but such treatment is expensive and the delay increases the risk of severe damage.
Mitchell told a Minneapolis meeting of the American Academy of Neurology on Thursday about her two-year study of 149 patients given the drug. Diastat was safely administered by parents and caregivers, she said, and maintained its efficacy even with repeated use.
Study Shows More Heart Attacks in Winter
Heart attacks are more likely to occur in winter than in summer, even in regions where there is no snow to shovel, according to a study in the May issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. Dr. Frederick A. Spencer and his colleagues at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center in Worchester examined the records of heart attacks reported to the National Registry of Myocardial Infarction and found that there were 53% more heart attacks in winter than in summer.
In the two-year period from July 1, 1994, to July 31, 1996, they observed the maximum number of heart attacks, 13,025, in January, compared to the lowest number, 5,978, in July. The same seasonal variation was observed in both women and men, in different age groups and in nine out of 10 geographic areas studied. Spencer had no explanation for the variation.
Estrogen Therapy May Help Parkinson’s Patients
Estrogen replacement therapy, which has previously been shown to retard the symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease, may also reduce the severity of the early stages of Parkinson’s disease. Dr. Rachel J. Saunders-Pullman of Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in New York and her colleagues studied 171 female Parkinson’s patients, 42 of whom had received estrogen and 129 who had not.
Saunders-Pullman reported on Thursday at the American Academy of Neurology meeting that estrogen did not stop or reverse the disease, but that those who took it had less disease progression. “This was reflected in being better able to function within daily living activities, such as dressing and walking, as well as in formal neurologic measurements for stiffness and slowness of movements,” she said.
Study: Mental Decline Linked to Tobacco, Age
Smoking after 65 may hasten mental deterioration, Dutch researchers said Wednesday at the American Academy of Neurology meeting. Their data suggests that the mental decline of elderly smokers may be tied to silent strokes--very small strokes that go unnoticed by their victims, said Laura Launer of Erasmus University Medical School in Rotterdam, Netherlands. She said smoking already is known to be a risk factor for stroke, which is a loss of blood flow that damages the brain.
The report pooled data from four European studies that looked at 9,223 nondemented people 65 and older: 22% were smokers, 36% were former smokers and 42% had never smoked. Participants were tested initially and about two years later on such things as short-term memory, time and place orientation, attention and calculation. All three groups experienced a decline in cognitive abilities, but the study found that older smokers had a significantly larger decline. Former smokers also had a slightly more rapid decline than nonsmokers.
Sleeping Pills May Be Hazardous to Your Health
People who regularly take prescription sleeping pills run a greater risk of dying early than those who do not, UC San Diego researchers report in the May 1 issue of Biological Psychiatry. “Overall, the hazard associated with taking sleeping pills at least 30 times a month was similar to the hazard of smoking one to two packs of cigarettes per day,” according to Dr. Daniel F. Kripke.
Even occasional use of the pills was associated with an elevation of risk, Kripke said. He noted, however, that today’s most popular sleeping pill, zolpidem, was not in use at the time of the study. Those covered in the study were flurazepam, temazepam and triazolam. He also cautioned that the study did not show that the pills caused the deaths.
Cholinesterase Inhibitor Could Be Alzheimer’s Aid
A new cholinesterase inhibitor called metrifonate significantly improves the psychiatric and behavioral disturbances of patients with mild or moderate Alzheimer’s disease, UCLA researchers said Wednesday at the American Academy of Neurology meeting.
Dr. Jeffrey Cummings said that metrifonate helped control hallucinations, apathy, depression, aggression and aberrant motor behaviors in the patients when compared to a placebo.
After six months of treatment, he said, the majority of patients given metrifonate either improved or showed no further deterioration in their psychiatric and behavioral symptoms. The most common side effects of treatment included leg cramps and gastrointestinal distress.
--Compiled by THOMAS H. MAUGH II
