Hepatology News and Research

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Hepatology is the branch of medicine that incorporates study of liver, gallbladder, biliary tree and pancreas as well as management of their disorders.

Study underscores need for monitoring vitamin D levels in all cirrhosis patients

Vitamin D deficiency is a well reported complication in chronic cholestatic liver disease such as primary biliary cirrhosis. While the prevalence and treatment of this deficiency has been addressed in many articles over the last decades, little is known of the vitamin D status in alcoholic liver cirrhosis.

16 Mar 2011

iTherX commences ITX-5061 Phase 1b study in patients with HCV

iTherX, a pharmaceutical company dedicated to discovering and developing a new class of therapies for hepatitis C, today announced that it has commenced patient recruitment in an open-label, proof-of-concept Phase 1b study of its lead compound ITX-5061 in liver transplant patients with hepatitis C virus infection.

16 Mar 2011

Repligen reports positive results from RG1068 Phase 3 study to improve MRI of the pancreas

Repligen Corporation reported today positive top-line results from a Phase 3 study to evaluate the safety and efficacy of RG1068, synthetic human secretin, to improve magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the pancreas in patients with pancreatic disease using endoscopy (ERCP) as a diagnostic reference.

14 Mar 2011

New study: Alcohol-related chronic pancreatitis is lower than other causes

The relative rate of alcohol-related chronic pancreatitis is lower when compared to other causes, according to a new study in Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, the official journal of the American Gastroenterological Association Institute.

14 Mar 2011

Vertex to present telaprevir and VX-222 study results against hepatitis C at EASL annual meeting

Vertex Pharmaceuticals Incorporated announced today that 15 abstracts on the company's medicines in development for hepatitis C, including its protease inhibitor, telaprevir, and polymerase inhibitor, VX-222, were accepted for presentation at the 46th Annual Meeting of the European Association for the Study of the Liver in Berlin, Germany, March 30 to April 3, 2011.

9 Mar 2011

Oral magnesium oxide is a safe treatment for children with chronic constipation

Magnesium-containing cathartics are commonly used to treat chronic constipation. Although hypermagnesemia is a rare clinical condition, it can occur as a side effect of increased intake of magnesium salts.

9 Mar 2011

First urinary metabolomic investigation in gastric cancer using gas chromatography/mass spectrometry

Metabolomics is a post-genomic research field for analysis of low molecular weight compounds in biological systems, and its approaches offer an analysis of metabolite level changes in biological samples. Recently, metabolomic method has shown great potentials in identifying the new diagnostic markers and therapeutic targets for cancers. However, metabolomic studies on cancer metastasis remain scarce.

9 Mar 2011

Autoimmune response mediated by T lymphocytes may play vital role in pathogenesis of biliary atresia

Biliary atresia (BA) is an inflammatory obliterative cholangiopathy with unknown etiology, leading to progressive fibrosis and cirrhosis. Microarray technology, emerged as an indispensable research tool for gene expression profiling, has been used to study the mechanism underlying BA, and allows the simultaneous analysis of thousands of transcripts within a single experiment.

9 Mar 2011

Study: HBV infection reduces risk of liver metastasis in CRC patients

Colorectal cancer is the second leading cause of cancer-related deaths in Western countries. Metastatic liver disease more frequently develops metachronous metastasis following treatment of CRC.

9 Mar 2011

EC grants marketing authorization for InterMune's Esbriet to treat IPF

InterMune, Inc. today announced that the European Commission has granted marketing authorization for Esbriet. Esbriet is indicated in adults for the treatment of mild to moderate idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, a progressive and fatal lung disease.

3 Mar 2011

Vertex announces positive interim results from telaprevir Phase 2 study in patients with HCV, HIV

Vertex Pharmaceuticals Incorporated announced today interim results from an ongoing, two-part, Phase 2 study evaluating telaprevir in combination with pegylated-interferon and ribavirin compared to pegylated-interferon and ribavirin alone in people who are infected with both genotype 1 hepatitis C virus and human immunodeficiency virus, also known as HCV-HIV co-infection.

3 Mar 2011

Scripps Health offers genetic testing to patients with Hepatitis C

Scripps Health is one of the first health systems in the United States to offer genetic testing as part of its care for hepatitis C patients planning to undergo drug treatment.

28 Feb 2011

Bristol-Myers Squibb awards $1 million grant to reduce hepatitis-related health disparities in Asia

The Bristol-Myers Squibb Foundation has awarded four new grants to help improve awareness, prevention and care of hepatitis B and hepatitis C in China and India.

25 Feb 2011

New research: Significant number of HCV patients in the U.S. does not have health insurance coverage

New research has determined that patients in the U.S. with hepatitis C virus are twice as likely to not have health insurance coverage compared with those without the disease.

24 Feb 2011

Lack of health insurance limits Hepatitis C patients' access to latest antiviral therapy

New research has determined that patients in the U.S. with hepatitis C virus (HCV) are twice as likely to not have health insurance coverage compared with those without the disease. In fact researchers found only a third of HCV infected Americans have access to antiviral therapy; the remaining are either uninsured or not candidates for therapy due to treatment contraindications. Details of this study are published in the March issue of Hepatology, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (AASLD).

24 Feb 2011

Norgine, Tranzyme commence dosing in ulimorelin Phase 3 study for restoring GI function after surgery

Tranzyme Pharma and Norgine B.V., have initiated dosing of ulimorelin in the first of two, Phase 3 pivotal studies - ULISES. Ulimorelin is Tranzyme's intravenous promotility agent in development for the management of postoperative ileus in hospital and acute care settings.

23 Feb 2011

Conatus commences multi-center CTS-1027 Phase 2b trial for HCV treatment

Conatus Pharmaceuticals Inc. announced today the treatment of the first patient in a multi-center Phase 2b clinical trial evaluating CTS-1027 in combination with Peginterferon Alfa-2a and ribavirin in a treatment experienced, hepatitis C null responder patient population. Safety, tolerability, and antiviral activity of the triple combination will be assessed after up to 48 weeks of therapy.

18 Feb 2011

Study finds heartburn as a common condition in Iceland

Heartburn is a signature symptom of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), which is a cluster of symptoms and signs associated with regurgitation of stomach acid up to the pharynx and mouth. Patient-based studies of GERD have shown high prevalence and chronicity, particularly in Western societies. GERD is associated with significant health-care utilization and diminished quality of life.

8 Feb 2011

Fast track rehabilitation program effective after colorectal surgery

The concept of fast track rehabilitation program has been recently introduced in colorectal surgery. It is basically a multidisciplinary perioperative care strategy for patients after resection of colorectal cancer.

8 Feb 2011

Study on non-surgical approach for treatment of liver hydatidosis

Concerning treatment, until recently the only definitive treatment for hydatid disease had been surgery. Different surgical techniques and procedures have been carried out and even in some cases, a liver transplant has been required. Advances in drug therapy has been influenced by the introduction of albendazole and accelerated by addition of praziquantel, but this requires a long period of treatment i.e. up to a year or more, and is not effective for everyone.

8 Feb 2011

Hepatology News and Research

Further Reading

Study underscores need for monitoring vitamin D levels in all cirrhosis patients

iTherX commences ITX-5061 Phase 1b study in patients with HCV

Repligen reports positive results from RG1068 Phase 3 study to improve MRI of the pancreas

New study: Alcohol-related chronic pancreatitis is lower than other causes

Vertex to present telaprevir and VX-222 study results against hepatitis C at EASL annual meeting

Oral magnesium oxide is a safe treatment for children with chronic constipation

First urinary metabolomic investigation in gastric cancer using gas chromatography/mass spectrometry

Autoimmune response mediated by T lymphocytes may play vital role in pathogenesis of biliary atresia

Study: HBV infection reduces risk of liver metastasis in CRC patients

EC grants marketing authorization for InterMune's Esbriet to treat IPF

Vertex announces positive interim results from telaprevir Phase 2 study in patients with HCV, HIV

Scripps Health offers genetic testing to patients with Hepatitis C

Bristol-Myers Squibb awards $1 million grant to reduce hepatitis-related health disparities in Asia

New research: Significant number of HCV patients in the U.S. does not have health insurance coverage

Lack of health insurance limits Hepatitis C patients' access to latest antiviral therapy

Norgine, Tranzyme commence dosing in ulimorelin Phase 3 study for restoring GI function after surgery

Conatus commences multi-center CTS-1027 Phase 2b trial for HCV treatment

Study finds heartburn as a common condition in Iceland

Fast track rehabilitation program effective after colorectal surgery

Study on non-surgical approach for treatment of liver hydatidosis

Improving healthcare sustainability through carbon data

A New Approach to Preventing Bladder Cancer Recurrence

Bringing real-time analytics to downstream bioprocess monitoring

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