For BP, flexibility is bad

High blood pressure is bad, and it seems that so is changing blood pressure. Significant fluctuations in BP can lead to dementia and other cognitive impairments, according to a new Aussie study.

At the same time, they also found that higher variations in systolic BP (i.e., “the top number”) was linked with arterial stiffness.

“These results indicate that the different types of BP variability likely reflect different underlying biological mechanisms, and that systolic and diastolic blood pressure variation are both important for cognitive functioning in older adults.”

So it’s worth A) taking your blood pressure frequently, and B) learning to spell sphygmomanometer.

Treating the gut (and depression)

In today’s first entry for “drug for X also treats Y,” we have amitriptyline, the antidepressant. It can also treat irritable bowel syndrome. And not just a little bit, either. “[P]atients taking amitriptyline were almost twice as likely to report an overall improvement in symptoms as those taking a placebo,” according to the British scientists who published their findings.

Wondering why? According to one pharmacist, it’s not surprising that an SSRI would affect IBS: “With 90-95% of serotonin production occurring in the gut, it would seem viable that the gut can be affected by a regular dose of amitriptyline.”

Fighting bone loss (and malaria)

And in today’s second entry for “drug for X also treats Y” comes DHA (dihydroartemisinin), the malaria drug that — as predicted by one of our coming AI overlords — treated osteoporosis in mice by reducing their bone loss and preserving the bone structure.

The Chinese scientists who did the study used an AI to predict what kinds of molecule might tweak the right genes to get the body to build up its bones. And apparently that AI got it right.

Two caveats, though. First, it was in mice, and (with a few exceptions) mice aren’t people. Second, it wasn’t just popping a pill — they delivered the DHA directly to the bones using nanoparticles.

(And because the effect was predicted by an AI and uses nanotech, they get a double-buzzword score.)

Quantity over ‘quality’

Everyone knows that melanoma is the deadlier kind of skin cancer. Apparently, though, everyone is wrong. Well, sort of.

A new study out of France finds that while melanoma is deadlier in a head-to-head comparison with non-melanoma skin cancer, the latter has a lot more heads to compare. (Link is a PDF.)

In 2020, [non-melanoma skin cancer] accounted for 78% of all skin cancer cases, resulting in over 63,700 deaths. In contrast, melanoma caused an estimated 57,000 fatalities in the same year.

Formaldehyde on the chopping block

It’s been a long time coming, but the FDA is proposing to ban “formaldehyde and other formaldehyde-releasing chemicals (e.g., methylene glycol) as an ingredient in hair smoothing or hair straightening products’ — the kind used by a lot of Black women.

The agency has been warning about the chemicals for a while because they can cause a host of health issues especially if they’re breathed in (e.g., when heated in a poorly ventilated space). It’s also a carcinogen. It’s also been considering a ban for the last seven years but only got around to formally proposing it now.

The next next thing to worry about

Yellow fever. Yep, a warming climate means the mosquitoes that carry it are movin’ on up to the southern US. We’ve already seen homegrown cases of malaria, so it’s not entirely surprising. And there have been outbreaks of other diseases carried by the Aedes mosquito in the South.

The good news is that there’s a vaccine. The bad news is that we don’t have a stockpile of it, so a serious outbreak “could tear quickly through unimmunized populations across the American South, and it is unlikely that the U.S. government would be prepared to acquire and distribute vaccines in a timely manner.”

Short takes

That’ll be in aisle 3

A doctor in Virginia prescribed a woman a cat to treat her depression. (Spoiler: It worked. Teaser: It worked in the most tear-jerky way possible.)

Drugs getting high

Amazon is launching (ha!) drone delivery of prescriptions in College Station, Texas, before a planned expansion to other cities.

Artist’s conception