Pharma

OBJECTIVES: The standard process of central sterilization is crucial for the optimal functioning of the operating room. The outcome of this process is closely linked to the steps preceding the steps prior to the sterilization step itself. These steps include pre-disinfection carried out in the operating rooms and other stages, namely washing, drying and packaging, which must be performed in the central sterilization unit. In this context, this study aimed to describe the knowledge of the staff in the operating rooms and the central sterilization unit at Sahloul University Hospital in Sousse (Tunisia) in 2022, regarding the steps prior to the sterilization of reusable thermoresistant medical devices and to describe their practices in terms of compliance with these steps...

Aminopeptidases with varied substrate specificities are involved in different crucial physiological processes of cellular homeostasis. They also have wide applications in food and pharma industries. Within the bacterial cell, broad specificity aminopeptidases primarily participate in the recycling of amino acids by degrading oligopeptides generated via primary proteolysis mediated by cellular ATP-dependent proteases. However, in bacteria, a truly broad specificity enzyme, which can cleave off acidic, basic, Gly and hydrophobic amino acid residues, is extremely rare...

Inhaled nitric oxide (NO) has been used in pediatric and adult perioperative cardiac intensive care for over three decades. NO is a cellular signaling molecule that induces smooth muscle relaxation in the mammalian vasculature. Inhaled NO has the unique ability to exert its vasodilatory effects in the pulmonary vasculature without any hypotensive side-effects in the systemic circulation. In patients undergoing cardiac surgery, NO has been reported in numerous studies to exert beneficial effects on acutely lowering pulmonary artery pressure and reversing right ventricular dysfunction and/or failure...

OBJECTIVES: In order to share their knowledge, sterilization unit managers publish the results of their work in journals or at scientific conferences. The aim of Enthalpies is to list all such work in a single database. The work presented describes the construction of this database and the assessment of its feasibility for the washing step. METHODS: The first step was to carry out a literature review. Only articles published over 10 years (2013-2023) in connection with the ten-year washing stage were included...

SARS-CoV-2 pandemic affected lifestyle habits, and the mental health and wellbeing of people around the world. In this manuscript, two towns (Paulton and Radstock) and two cities (Bath and Bristol) in Southwest England (> 1 million people) were monitored for two years using Wastewater-Based Epidemiology to assess impacts of COVID (including management measures such as lockdowns and movement restrictions) on community lifestyle choices: illicit drugs, legal stimulants, abused pharmaceuticals and pain pharma usage...

BACKGROUND: Concerns remain over the long-term safety of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) inhibitors to treat retinopathy of prematurity (ROP). RAINBOW is an open label randomised trial comparing intravitreal ranibizumab (in 0.2 mg and 0.1 mg doses) with laser therapy in very low birthweight infants (<1500 g) with ROP. METHODS: Of 201 infants completing RAINBOW, 180 were enrolled in the RAINBOW Extension Study. At 5 years, children underwent ophthalmic, development and health assessments...

DNA-encoded libraries (DELs) have demonstrated to be one of the most powerful technologies within the ligand identification toolbox, widely used either in academia or biotech and pharma companies. DEL methodology utilizes affinity selection (AS) as the approach to interrogate the protein of interest for the identification of binders. Here we present a high-throughput, fully automated AS platform developed to fulfill industrial standards and compatible with different assay formats to improve the reproducibility of the AS process for DEL binders identification...

SARS-CoV-2 pandemic had a significant impact on the society, economy, and health of people around the world with consequences that need to be better understood for future pandemic preparedness. This manuscript provides insights into the usage of pharmaceuticals for pain treatment management throughout SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Four towns and cities with a total population of > 1 million people covering an area of 2000 km2 in South West England were monitored for twenty-four months. Results showed different patterns in pain pharma usage, with small towns having higher population normalised daily loads (PNDLs) than big cities for majority of pain killers studied...

Discovery research is the starting point for the development of more effective anti-cancer treatments. It requires an interdisciplinary research environment with first-class infrastructural support in which curiosity-driven research can lead to new concepts for treating cancer. Translating such research findings to clinical practice requires complementary skills and infrastructures, including high-quality clinical facilities, access to patient cohorts and participation of pharma. This complex ecosystem has yielded many new but also "me too" treatment regimens, especially in immuno-oncology resulting in an extremely high pricing of anti-cancer agents...

Whey, a component of milk and a useful by-product of the dairy industry's casein and cheese-making, has been used for generations to augment animal feed. It contains a range of proteins, including α -lactalbumin, β -lactoglobulin, bovine serum albumin, heavy and light chain immunoglobulins, lactoferrin, glycomacropeptide, and lactoperoxidase. Whey proteins exhibit great potential as biopolymers for creating bioactive delivery systems owing to their distinct health-enhancing characteristics and the presence of numerous amino acid groups within their structures...

Pharmacosiderite Mo4 P3 O16 (Pharma-MoPO) consists of [Mo4 O4 ] cubane unit and [PO4 ] tetrahedral to form an open framework with a microporous structure similar to that of LTA-type zeolite. Although attractive applications are expected due to its microporous structure and redox-active components, its physicochemical properties have been poorly investigated due to the specificity of its synthesis, which requires a high hydrothermal synthesis temperature of 360 °C. In this study, we succeeded in synthesizing Pharma-MoPO by hydrothermal synthesis at 230 °C, which can be applied using a commercially available autoclave by changing the metal source...

BACKGROUND: Despite known adverse impacts on patients and health systems, 'incentive-linked prescribing', which describes the prescribing of medicines that result in personal benefits for the prescriber, remains a widespread and hidden impediment to quality of healthcare. We investigated factors perpetuating incentive-linked prescribing among primary care physicians in for-profit practices (referred to as private doctors), using Pakistan as a case study. METHODS: Our mixed-methods study synthesised insights from a survey of 419 systematically samples private doctors and 68 semi-structured interviews with private doctors (n=28), pharmaceutical sales representatives (n=12), and provincial and national policy actors (n=28)...

BACKGROUND: Primary aldosteronism (PA) is caused by autonomous aldosterone overproduction and characterised by uncontrolled hypertension. There are currently no treatments that target aldosterone synthesis. We evaluated the safety and efficacy of a novel aldosterone synthase inhibitor, dexfadrostat phosphate, in patients with PA. METHODS: This multi-centre, randomised, phase 2 trial was conducted between November 2019 and May 2022 (NCT04007406; EudraCT code 2019-000919-85)...

Endotoxins are toxic lipopolysaccharides (LPSs), extending from the outer membrane of Gram-negative bacteria and notorious for their toxicity and deleterious effects. The comparison of different LPSs, isolated from various Gram-negative bacteria, shows a global similar architecture corresponding to a glycolipid lipid A moiety, a core oligosaccharide, and outermost long O-chain polysaccharides with molecular weights from 2 to 20 kDa. LPSs display high diversity and specificity among genera and species, and each bacterium contains a unique set of LPS structures, constituting its protective external barrier...

High failure rates of the current drug development process are driving exemplary changes toward methodologies centered on human disease in-vitro modeling. Organoids are self-organized tissue sub-units resembling their organ of origin and are widely acknowledged for their unique potential in recapitulating human physio-pathological mechanisms. They are transformative for human health by becoming the platform of choice to probe disease mechanisms and advance new therapies. Furthermore, the compounds' validation as therapeutics represents another point of the drug development pipeline where organoids may provide key understandings and help pharma organizations replace or reduce animal research...

Cryptococcal meningitis is a deadly disease with few treatment options. Its incidence is still high and closely linked to the HIV/AIDS epidemic. This study aimed to develop a mucoadhesive microsphere delivery system for fluconazole for the intranasal route. Microspheres of mucoadhesive fluconazole formulation variables, such as different amounts of drug concentration and polymer concentration, were prepared by a simple emulsion-crosslinking method. The prepared microspheres' surface was characterised by SEM (Scanning electron microscopy) and evaluated for particle size, entrapment efficiency, production yield, infrared spectroscopic study, in-vitro mucoadhesion, and in-vitro drug release...

BACKGROUND: The treatment of melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer, has greatly benefited from immunotherapy. However, many patients do not show a durable response, which is only partially explained by known resistance mechanisms. METHODS: We performed single-cell RNA sequencing of tumor immune infiltrates and matched peripheral blood mononuclear cells of 22 checkpoint inhibitor (CPI)-naive stage III-IV metastatic melanoma patients. After sample collection, the same patients received CPI treatment, and their response was assessed...

OBJECTIVE: To assess awareness, perceptions and use related to evidence-based revision methods by undergraduate medical students. METHODS: The descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted in three medical colleges of Rawalpindi, Islamabad, Pakistan, from December 01, 2019, to January 31, 2020, after approval from the ethics review committee of Army Medical College, Rawalpindi. The sample comprised undergraduate medical students of either gender. Data was collected online using a 10-item standardised questionnaire...

One of the significant aromatic plants applied in food and pharma is cumin. Despite its massive trading in Egypt, there are no comprehensive reports on cumin landraces profile screening. This study aimed to investigate the variation in seeds' physical and biochemical profiles and genetic diversity as well as assess the efficiency of seeds' germination under salinity stress. Consequently, during the 2020/2021 growing season, four common cumin seed landraces were gathered from various agro-climatic regions: El Gharbia, El Menia, Assiut, and Qena...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.