Posted on 12/21/2005 12:46:31 AM PST by neverdem
Associated Press
CHICAGO — Holiday revelers beware: Seasonal indulgences such as eggnog and fruitcake might give you heartburn, but the acid-fighting medicine you take for relief might lead to something worse, researchers say.
People on popular prescription drugs for treating acid reflux — Prilosec, Prevacid and Nexium — seem more prone to getting a potentially dangerous diarrhea caused by the bacterium Clostridium difficile, new research shows. C-diff, as it's known, can cause severe diarrhea and crampy intestinal inflammation called colitis.
Dr. Sandra Dial and colleagues at McGill University in Montreal examined data on more than 18,000 patients in the United Kingdom from 1994 to 2004. During that time, 1,672 cases of C-diff were diagnosed, and the numbers increased from less than 1 per 100,000 in 1994 to 22 per 100,000 last year.
Patients with prescriptions for powerful acid fighters called proton pump inhibitors, which include Prilosec and Prevacid, were almost three times more likely to be diagnosed with the bug than those not taking the drugs.
Those on less potent prescription drugs called H2 receptor antagonists, which include Pepcid and Zantac, were two times more likely than nonusers to get C-diff infections.
The widely used and heavily promoted drugs reduce levels of gastric acid that can keep C-diff at bay.
Dr. L. Clifford McDonald, a researcher at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said proton pump inhibitors recently were implicated in a C-diff outbreak in Maine.
"It's not surprising in my mind that there could be some association" with acid-fighting drugs, said McDonald.
Most study patients hadn't been recently hospitalized and weren't taking antibiotics, both risk factors for C-difficile infections. The study will appear in Wednesday's Journal of the American Medical Association.
A co-author is a consultant for AstraZeneca, which markets Prilosec and Nexium, and Altana Pharma, which makes and markets another prescription heartburn drug, Protonix, in Europe.
A spokesman for Wyeth, which markets Protonix in the United States, said the company hadn't seen the research and declined to comment.
AstraZeneca spokeswoman Cindy Callaghan said, "Further research is needed ... to determine the validity of a potential link."
Dr. Michael Brown, a gastroenterologist at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, who was not involved in the study, said short-term use of potent acid-fighting drugs is unlikely to increase infection risks in otherwise healthy people. But he said the study results suggest doctors and patients "have to think twice about using such heavy acid suppression" over the long term.
No, that will make you slip on the ice and die of a head injury, just like Dr. Adkins.
That'll help too, for sure...:)
So true.
LOL@Larry
BTW
Any of various small lizardlike amphibians
fried or bolied do tend to make me a bit queezy
though. :>)
I have had to leave dairy and grains. Lactose intolerance and gluten sensitivity run in my family.
Thanks you.
My doc asked me how I turned all the glucose, cholesteral and dropped 55lbs in 6months.
My reply I followed the ADA guidlines you sent me to class for.
They do work. I will be the first to say it is hard work being active on top of an already active life and making the psychologilcal changes about what eating is all about.
But the outcome is very rewarding.
Best to you and yours Merry Christmas.
Serves you right for eating them, you barbarian!
;D
This is exactly what Thomas Sowell talks about - trade offs! You cannot have something without something else happening. You cannot have a perfect accident free world. Yet, some liberal do-gooder will read this and want to ban all anti acid drugs.
Ow.
I'd be miserable without my milk.
[farm girl and all that]...;)
Merry Christmas to you, Oceanperch.
[I used to know a gal named "Ocean Flea"...any relation?]...;]
Serves you right for eating them, you barbarian!
I'll have you know I am not a barbarian.
.........Just a redneck from Mississippi. :>)
----LMAO
Because the brain requires cholesterol to function, one must seriously wonder about the first whisperings of a link between Alzheimer's and drugs such as Lipitor and Zocor. If we all ate less and what we ate was wholesome and we all walked a couple of miles a day, the big pharmas would be out of business. Fortunately for them, few individuals have the will to change their unhealthy life styles.
Like I can talk....:))
All my kin came from WV and the mountains of central VA.
[we ain't rednecks baby, we'uns hillbillies!]....;D
"Simple heartburn preventative: Low carb diet!"
Yup, works like a charm. No fun at all, but works great.
One of the most common "side effects" of Lipitor is memory loss.
Well, duh.
Your brain is made of cholesterol and you're eliminating it intentionally.
Hubby went through the 'brain fog' and muscle pains for years.
He's talking Coenzyme Q-10 to correct it.
Lipitor's makers knew that it destroyed CoQ10 but refused to admit it.
Now they have a new formula which includes a puny amount of CoQ10 to make up for [a miniscule amount of] what it destroys.
Evil creeps.
They are good for *something*....:)
What I really miss is the gluten. Because it is more than pasta and bread. I have to avoid gravies, cream soups, etc., because they all have a flour base.
Rice and potatoes can get boring.
The hardest part of a low-carb diet is resisting the inevitable urge to turn around three times before sitting on the sofa.
*woof*
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