Plant or Lab? The Cannabis plant has been used for its medicinal properties for millennia. It also has psychogenic effects and abuse potential that seem to derive primarily from one component—delta-(9)-tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC. But the Cannabis plant, chemically speaking, is so much more, and the discovery and further elucidation, starting...
Is Factor XI a Reasonable Therapeutic Target for Anticoagulation?
For five decades, the only option for oral anticoagulation used in patients with venous thromboembolic disease and atrial fibrillation was warfarin (Coumadin®), a vitamin K antagonist originally derived from a rodenticide.1 Warfarin works by inhibiting the body’s synthesis of clotting factors that require vitamin K: Factors II, VII, IX, and...
Hyperlipidemia
In 1999, the IOM’s landmark report To Err is Human: Building a Safer Health System, explored the impact of medical errors on clinical outcomes in terms of human lives.1 Importantly, recommendations from that report included establishing interdisciplinary team training and implementing an interdisciplinary, collaborative approach to re-designing complex systems of...
Omadacycline: A New Weapon in the Fight Against MRSA
Those of us “of a certain age” have a life-long familiarity with the tetracycline antibiotics. First introduced in the 1940s, their broad spectrum of activity against a number of important community pathogens was a great asset. Tetracyclines were used to treat a wide range of both gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria,...
ASHP IPCE
In 1999, the IOM’s landmark report To Err is Human: Building a Safer Health System, explored the impact of medical errors on clinical outcomes in terms of human lives.1 Importantly, recommendations from that report included establishing interdisciplinary team training and implementing an interdisciplinary, collaborative approach to re-designing complex systems of...
THE ENDOCANNABINOID SYSTEM HITS PRIME TIME!
See this COVID-19/social distancing story from CNN.com: https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/23/health/sleep-craving-carbs-coronavirus-wellness/index.html In a prior post we discussed the human endocannabinoid system (ECS), that vast and diverse neuromodulatory system that contributes to homeostasis throughout the body. Not a surprise to people who have used cannabis, the ECS has substantial input into our hunger and...