Celebrate your techs!

In the Before Times we would have suggested hugging a tech (or two) today, but now we can only recommend an extra-friendly wave from across the room. Happy Pharmacy Technician Day!

Not all heroes wear capes (but they all wear masks)

Insulin: Keep it in the box

The FDA would like to remind you that you should keep insulin pens in their original boxes — dispense them to a single patient in that sealed carton. “[I]ndividual insulin pens with different dosages or formulations often have similar appearances that can be difficult to distinguish.”

“D” is for “Don’t stop taking it when you get older”

Do you have older mice patients who are looking frail? You might consider giving them some major doses of vitamin D. A study out of Buffalo University found that “frailty can be slowed with what might be considered ‘over’ supplementation with vitamin D, referred to as ‘hypersufficiency’.”

Even mice that had good vitamin D levels throughout life had problems when their D levels were decreased in old age.

“We found that in aged mice, low levels of vitamin D result in physical declines, such as reduced grip strength and grip endurance — the ability to sustain a grip — and that they started developing as soon as one month after reduction of vitamin D intake.”

Basic meds fight lung cancer

A study of 732,199 people found that those who used aspirin, metformin, or statins — or better yet, more than one of those — had a lower risk of dying from lung cancer. But say it with me: “Further studies are necessary.”

Fat grenades fight infection

Aussie scientists have just found a cool way the human body fights infection: Shooting blobs of fat at invaders. Yes, technically they’re “lipid droplets,” but “fat blobs” is much more entertaining. It seems that bacteria will feed on these lipids, so cells have learned to pack them with poison.

“[C]ells manufacture toxic proteins, package them into the lipid droplets, then fire them at the intruders. This is a new way that cells are protecting themselves, using fats as a covert weapon, and giving us new insights into ways of fighting infection.”

Artist’s conception

If you give a mouse a cookie … it might get manic

Conventional wisdom says that you can give kids a sugar rush. Science has said it’s not true. It seems that science may have spoken too soon: New research from the University of Colorado has found that yes, fructose might trigger “manic behaviors” including ADHD.

In short, fructose (they say) lowers cells’ energy levels, triggering “foraging response similar to what occurs in starvation.” That response — the quest for food — “stimulates risk taking, impulsivity, novelty seeking, rapid decision making, and aggressiveness.”

Covid notes

Existing drugs might help: amodiaquine, nebivolol, and zuclophentixol cleared the SARS-CoV-2 virus … from test tubes.

Deaths at home: “Georgia surpasses 7,500 COVID-19 related deaths.”

Georgia: The state “faces enormous challenges to distribute a COVID-19 vaccine.” (Spoiler: So does every state.)

CVS: It’s pushing for the federal government to allow pharmacy technicians to give the eventual Covid-19 vaccine(s).

Is that a robot in your colon?

A new way of delivering drugs where you need them might be microscopic robots. Using magnetic fields, Purdue University researchers were able to send one tumbling through the colon (yes, there’s cool video) where — in theory — it could be directed to a specific location to release its medical payload.

Getting a drug directly to its target site could remove side effects, such as hair loss or stomach bleeding, that the drug may otherwise cause by interacting with other organs along the way.

Money quote: “The researchers chose the colon for in vivo experiments because it has an easy point of entry – and it’s very messy.”