Coronavirus and more: An opinionated take on NEJM highlights for January/February 2020
Posted by Marc Herant on March 2, 2020 in NEJM Highlights
Keeping up with COVID-19 It’s not easy for a refereed weekly print periodical to keep up with an epidemic that evolves on a daily basis, but the NEJM is doing its best and all articles are free on-line. Most interesting beyond the description of the initial cluster in Wuhan are: (1) the first US case was quite severe and the patient received the antiviral remdesivir (was in development by Gilead for Ebola, but showing activity against coronaviruses) – it is now in testing in China; (2) the rigorous documentation of disease transmission by an asymptomatic individual to another in Germany… Read More
Tax dollars doing good work: An opinionated take on NEJM highlights for December 2019
Posted by Marc Herant on January 5, 2020 in NEJM Highlights
The loneliness of the patent-less drug Colchicine is a very old drug commonly used in gout with an anti-inflammatory mechanism of action that is not well defined. It is a generic (although in the US, the story is somewhat peculiar) and therefore incentives are lacking for further development in new indications by private companies. Given a well-established (but not well-understood) connection between inflammation and cardiovascular events, some researchers have hypothesized and explored potential utility in patients with high cardiovascular risk – but this would have to be validated by a robust, large, expensive, randomized-controlled trial. Thanks to the Canadian… Read More