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Patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) were at risk for long-term poor outcomes after myocardial infarction (MI), Finnish researchers found.
The cumulative all-cause mortality during 14 years of follow-up after MI among RA patients was 80.4% compared with 72.3% among matched controls, for a hazard ratio of 1.25 (95% CI 1.16-1.35,
P 0.0001), according to Antti Palomäki, MD, PhD, of Turku University Hospital in Turku, Finland, and colleagues.
Factors that were associated with increased mortality among RA patients were duration of RA (HR 1.06, 95% CI 1.04-1.09,
P 0.0001) per 5-year increment, use of corticosteroids (HR 1.27, 95% CI 1.11-1.45,
P 0.001), and corticosteroid dosage per 1 mg/day (HR 1.05, 95% CI 1.02-1.08,
Scientists reprogram a common bacterium to make designer sugar-based drug
Envisioning an animal-free drug supply, scientists have -; for the first time -; reprogrammed a common bacterium to make a designer polysaccharide molecule used in pharmaceuticals and nutraceuticals. Published today in
Nature Communications, the researchers modified
E. coli to produce chondroitin sulfate, a drug best known as a dietary supplement to treat arthritis that is currently sourced from cow trachea.
Genetically engineered
E. coli is used to make a long list of medicinal proteins, but it took years to coax the bacteria into producing even the simplest in this class of linked sugar molecules -; called sulfated glycosaminoglycans -;that are often used as drugs and nutraceuticals..
Researchers develop mutant gene-targeted immunotherapy approach to fight cancers
A novel targeted immunotherapy approach developed by researchers at the Ludwig Center, the Lustgarten Laboratory, and Bloomberg~Kimmel Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center employs new antibodies against genetically altered proteins to target cancers.
The researchers targeted their immunotherapy approach to alterations in the common cancer-related p53 tumor suppressor gene, the RAS tumor-promoting oncogene or T-cell receptor genes. They also tested the therapy on cancer cells in the laboratory and in animal tumor models. Their findings are reported in three related studies published March 1 in
Science Immunology,
In a study published online February 25, 2021 in The New England Journal of Medicine, a repurposed drug used to treat arthritis did not significantly improve the outcomes of patients with severe COVID-19 pneumonia.
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The addition of an immunomodulating agent to pegloticase (Krystexxa) among patients with uncontrolled gout significantly improved response rates, a systematic literature review found.
In a cohort of patients whose gout had been refractory to conventional therapy, co-treatment with pegloticase plus an immunomodulator was associated with an overall response rate of 82.9%, reported Robert T. Keenan, MD, of Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, and colleagues.
That rate was markedly higher than the 42% that had been observed for pegloticase monotherapy in clinical trials, Keenan and co-authors noted in their study online in
Pegloticase is approved for patients with chronic gout who have inadequate serum urate control with xanthine oxidase inhibitors at the highest medically appropriate dose or in whom these drugs are contraindicated.