Cutting through the clutter

Sure, looking at a TikTok video, a “study” from a politician, or a random post on Facebook is a great way to get accurate medical information^*, but sometimes people can still be be confused.

Can rubbing horse manure under your nose prevent Covid? Is the flu really caused by an excess of yellow bile? What can you treat using a hammer and a book on reverse phrenology?

As Drug Topics explains, “[P]atients often don’t know how to analyze the news they are watching or the stories their friends and family are sharing on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.”

And that, it says, is where pharmacists come in. Besides ‘explain why a flu shot is important,’ it’s got a few other tips for communicating with patients in an era where people believe in vast conspiracies to keep them healthy.

* This is sarcasm.

Congrats to Tierra Jackson!

A big Buzz shout out to P4 UGA student pharmacist Tierra Jackson — the newest president of the Student National Pharmaceutical Association, just featured in the latest issue of UGA Today.

Paxlovid reduces long Covid

Specifically, it reduces the symptoms of the condition, not the risk of getting it. That’s what Veterans Affairs researchers found by studying more than 56,000 vets who tested positive for Covid-19.

[T]hose given the oral antiviral medication in the first 5 days of a Covid-19 infection had a 25% decreased risk of developing 10 of 12 different long Covid conditions studied — including heart disease, blood disorders, fatigue, liver disease, kidney disease, muscle pain, neurocognitive impairment, and shortness of breath.

And this held true whether or not the person was vaccinated or not, or had previously been infected.

Techs, your time is almost here!

Technicians (and those who love them!) — don’t forget that TechU 3.0 is this coming Saturday, November 12! If have haven’t registered yet, there’s still time!

Head over to GPhA.org/techu for the details, the schedule, and the registration link!

We switched their real blood with blood made in a lab.
Will they notice?

That’s what British researchers are going to find out, after they made the world’s first transfusions of lab-grown blood into two patients. If it works, it could mean the end of shortages for rare blood types.

A couple of notes: They didn’t, like, replace these patients’ entire blood supply — it was just “a couple of spoonfuls”.

The other note is that this isn’t artificial blood. It was made using the stem cells from real, human blood that were then “cultivated to grow in massive numbers before being ‘guided’ to become red blood cells.”

If the patients’ bodies don’t reject the “artificial” donation, it could be an absolute game changer for increasing supplies of previously ultra-rare blood types, and may even one day enable smaller and less frequent transfusions.

If this works, more trials will follow — and then, maybe, the game will actually change.

The Nervous Nellies™ were right

The flu is shaping up to be bad this season. Like, really bad, with hospitalizations the highest the CDC has recorded in a decade.

And at the moment it’s worst in the southeast/south central states — Georgia has the 8th highest level of activity according to the Walgreens Flu Index:

Keeping ’em short

Let’s say you’re pregnant and don’t want your kid to be too tall — banging into doorways and getting neckaches from sitting in the back seat. Good news: You may be able to shave a full inch off your kid’s height by having caffeine while you’re carrying.

Researchers [from the National Institutes of Health] measured concentrations of caffeine and paraxanthine — a metabolite of caffeine — in the pregnant person’s blood during the first trimester of pregnancy. They then looked at children’s heights up to age 8.

The analysis indicated that caffeine consumption during pregnancy was associated with children being shorter later in life.

And it doesn’t take much, either — “[M]aternal consumption of caffeine of even less than 200 mg per day is associated with smaller child growth.”

The Long Read: Marijuana Legalization Results edition

It’s been 10 years since Colorado made recreational marijuana legal, which seemed, to University of Colorado neuroscience researchers, a good time to look at the big picture.

“Before, research focused almost exclusively on the harms because it was only thought of as an illegal substance. Now we can focus on the full continuum.”

Sure, legalization has been good for state budgets, raising tax revenue and cutting (or redirecting) enforcement spending. But what about the health and behavior effects? Check out “A decade after legalizing cannabis in Colorado, here’s what we’ve learned.”