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Viagra Helps Protect At-Risk Newborns
November 02, 2006
The erectile
dysfunction drug Viagra may have found a new, potentially life-saving
use in hospital pediatric intensive care units, researchers report.
Australian researchers gave the drug to 15 babies with congenital
heart disease who were being weaned from inhaled nitric-oxide therapy,
a treatment that ICUs use to help these infants survive.
The researchers found that a dose of Viagra
prevented a common life-threatening complication called rebound
pulmonary hypertension. They also found that it significantly reduced
the amount of time the babies spent on mechanical ventilation and
in the ICU.
"Rebound pulmonary hypertension is a very common problem,"
said Dr. Steven Abman of The Children's Hospital in Denver, who
was not part of the study. "This is the most rigorous study
that's ever been done to demonstrate that Viagra can prevent this
complication."
The study results were published in the November issue of the American
Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.
Viagra is useful for treating both erectile dysfunction and preventing
rebound pulmonary hypertension because it affects pathways involved
in both conditions.
"Viagra enhances the body's levels of cyclic-GMP,
a naturally occurring substance that relaxes arteries and reduces
their pressure, which is why its primary indication is for men with
erectile dysfunction," explained the study's lead researcher,
Dr. Lara Shekerdemian of the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit at the
Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne.
"However, cyclic-GMP is abundant in the lungs and is the molecule
via which nitric oxide acts as a dilator of pulmonary arteries,"
Shekerdemian said. "That's why its use was explored in the
setting of pulmonary hypertension in the newborn."
In the study, Shekerdemian and colleagues gave a single dose of
Viagra to 15 infants with congenital heart disease who were undergoing
withdrawal from nitric oxide, which is used to relax pulmonary blood
vessels in mechanically ventilated lungs. Another 14 infants undergoing
withdrawal were given placebo.
read more: http://www.forbes.com/forbeslife/health/feeds/hscout/2006/11/02/hscout535877.html
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