Posted on 08/01/2023 2:35:40 PM PDT by ConservativeMind
Our respiratory systems are lined with a thin fluid layer called mucus on the inside. The mucus protects us from inhaling harmful and unwanted airborne agents from germs to pollutants due to its unique gel-like texture imparted by proteins called mucins.
By extension, over- or under-secretion of mucins can lead to abnormal respiratory mucus—a pathological manifestation in many respiratory diseases like chronic bronchitis, cystic fibrosis, and asthma, among others. Although multiple clinically approved drugs are available that can combat abnormal respiratory mucus, many of them cause unwanted and potentially serious side effects.
Researchers repurposed an available drug called meclofenamate to understand its effects on the respiratory mucus. Meclofenamate had been traditionally used as a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug for treating arthritis, parasitic infections, and prostate cancer.
The researchers have now found that meclofenamate can also treat abnormal respiratory mucus by controlling mucin secretion.
The researchers tested the meclofenamate in a cell line called NCI-H292 that mimicked the respiratory cells, replete with the secretion of mucus with mucins. Specifically, they checked for the expression of a gene responsible for secreting a key mucin, MUC5AC. Further, they explored the molecular pathways involved. Their findings hit the bull's eye, to say the least.
Their results suggested that meclofenamate markedly reduced the gene and, additionally, the protein expression of MUC5AC. The drug was found to achieve this by influencing a biomolecular pathway that is extensively involved in the immune response, namely the nuclear factor kappa light chain enhancer of activated B (or NF-kB) cell signaling pathway; it reduced the degradation of a biomolecular component called 'inhibitory kappa Bα' and the movement of another such component called 'p65' into the nucleus of the respiratory cells.
The gist of these findings is clear—meclofenamate is capable of controlling mucin secretion, and in turn, the characteristics of respiratory mucus.
(Excerpt) Read more at medicalxpress.com ...
Mucus is amazing. The mucus molecule gets absorbed by germs and then absorbs water from the germ. Once water is absorbed, the mucus molecule explodes to 100 times its original size. A built in bomb.
WHAT? An off label use? What kind of insanity is this? I just spent three years incorrectly hearing that drugs can only be prescribed by a doctor for the precise specific purpose the FDA approved it for.
Has it switched back now?
Bttt
Yeah, funny that, huh.
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