Posted on 12/15/2024 9:32:03 PM PST by ConservativeMind
A common heart drug may slow the progression of Huntington's disease (HD), according to a study.
The UI team found that the use of beta-blocker drugs—commonly used to treat heart and blood pressure issues—was associated with both a significantly later onset of HD symptoms for people in the pre-symptomatic stages, and a slower rate of symptom worsening for those with symptoms.
Beta-blockers work by blocking the action of norepinephrine, a neurotransmitter and hormone involved in the "fight or flight" response.
"Patients with HD have a slightly more active sympathetic nervous system, which is what drives the fight or flight response, and theoretically have more norepinephrine," Schultz explains.
"We have hypothesized that this subtle change may be contributing to the neurodegeneration that occurs in HD"
To investigate the potential effect of beta-blocker use, the UI researcher used data from the world's largest observational study for Huntington's disease families known as Enroll-HD. This database follows more than 21,000 patients with either an HD diagnosis or at risk for HD over their lifetime.
The UI researchers identified two distinct groups of HD patients; those with the genetic mutation that causes HD but who have not yet started showing significant clinical symptoms (preHD group), and patients who have already received a clinical diagnosis of HD, referred to as motor-manifest patients (mmHD group). Within each group, they identified patients who were taking a beta-blocker for at least one year.
Next, the team matched 174 preHD and 149 mmHD beta-blocker users to the same number of similar non-beta-blocker users.
The team's analysis showed that preHD beta-blocker users had a significantly lower yearly risk of receiving a clinical diagnosis of HD.
Among the mmHD group, the researchers showed that the patients taking beta-blockers had significant slowing of the gradual worsening.
(Excerpt) Read more at medicalxpress.com ...
Beta blockers are a common blood pressure medicine.
Huntington’s disease is horrible.
I had a friend pass due to this, ran in his family. You are correct.
Just sent this on to my best friend. Her HD has reached a nasty stage, so I thank you for putting this up. Only good thing is that she’s had very late onset, which took her through her career, thank goodness. I worked a block away from her and she got me a conference room for the local group I ran and helped with sponsorship for speaker travel. Then she got me her company’s sponsorship for a newsletter I started. I ran conferences in this country. She ran conferences in Europe. She taught my first class in computer language design. I can still remember her teaching about alpha-beta decision tree pruning for computer developed chess programs. Absolutely BRILLIANT researcher.
She used to write articles for Women & Guns and I suspect shooting was how she tracked if her symptoms had yet started. That’s how our friendship developed when she needed a buddy to shoot with and talked me into going with her to the range. I was TERRIFIED and she put a gun into my hand and said there’s one bullet in it. When you pull the trigger, you’re making the gun safe. Blew my mind. But I couldn’t make the drive home afterwards without getting sick, so I’d stay the night on her sofa.
Later, I went with her for the HD testing before the technology was up to finding out if she had the gene. Now I’m the sounding board for her husband when he panics. Anything that helps that horrible disease is to be applauded, so thank you for the article.
I’ve been on a beta blocker for years. That must be why my mind is as sharp as a....as a...as a...what’s it called again?
so is it the drug, or the results of the drug (keeping blood pressure down / under control) that has this effect on the disease?
It is the drug’s activity. It blocks a certain hormone that is crucial to HD.
Other blood pressure medicines don’t block this.
bkmk
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