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Friday, June 10, 2011

Medical News: Cancer Risk Forces Actos Off French, German Markets - in Endocrinology, Diabetes from MedPage Today

Medical News: Cancer Risk Forces Actos Off French, German Markets - in Endocrinology, Diabetes from MedPage Today

Excerpt:

Drug regulators in Germany and France have ordered doctors to stop prescribing the type 2 diabetes drug pioglitazone (Actos) following a French study suggesting a heightened risk of bladder cancer.


But the European Medicines Agency (EMA), the FDA, and their Japanese counterpart have withheld action pending additional review of the data.

The French study, conducted by the nation's health insurance agency, examined cancer rates in some 155,000 people taking pioglitazone in France from 2006 to 2009 and 1.3 million other diabetics who were not receiving the agent.

The researchers found an adjusted hazard ratio of 1.22 (95% CI 1.05 to 1.43) for bladder cancer among those on pioglitazone.

There also appeared to be a dose effect, with a higher risk (HR 1.75, 95% CI 1.22 to 2.50) among patients receiving a cumulative dosage of 28,000 mg or more during the study period.

The study was completed on Tuesday. France's regulatory agency officially suspended sales of pioglitazone on Thursday, and Germany followed suit early Friday.

Both agencies recommended that patients currently taking the drug continue to do so until they talk to their doctors about alternative medications.

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Pharmacy History

"The earliest known compilation of medicinal substances was ARIANA the Sushruta Samhita, an Indian Ayurvedic treatise attributed to Sushruta in the 6th century BC. However, the earliest text as preserved dates to the 3rd or 4th century AD.
Many Sumerian (late 6th millennium BC - early 2nd millennium BC) cuneiform clay tablets record prescriptions for medicine.[3]

Ancient Egyptian pharmacological knowledge was recorded in various papyri such as the Ebers Papyrus of 1550 BC, and the Edwin Smith Papyrus of the 16th century BC.

The earliest known Chinese manual on materia medica is the Shennong Bencao Jing (The Divine Farmer's Herb-Root Classic), dating back to the 1st century AD. It was compiled during the Han dynasty and was attributed to the mythical Shennong. Earlier literature included lists of prescriptions for specific ailments, exemplified by a manuscript "Recipes for 52 Ailments", found in the Mawangdui tomb, sealed in 168 BC. Further details on Chinese pharmacy can be found in the Pharmacy in China article."

From Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharmacy#History_of_pharmacy

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