Start hormone replacement early

Hormone replacement therapy, often taken by women who are experiencing the downsides of post-menopausal hormone change, has another effect: It seem to protect against dementia.

The important kicker, though, is that to get the most of that benefit it needs to be started early, according to a new study out of Weill Cornell Medicine. And by “early” they mean as soon as menopausal symptoms start, i.e., in perimenopause.

If that happens — if she starts taking them early and keeps going for 10 or more years — “there was a 26% reduced risk of dementia.”

Quoth the lead researcher:

“[I]n the right woman, at the right dose, and for the right duration of time, I believe that hormone replacement therapy can be one of our most powerful tools to reduce a woman’s risk for cognitive decline.”

Side note: What’s the difference between hormone therapy and hormone replacement therapy? Find a nice explanation right here.

Correction

Grr. We made a stupid mistake in Saturday’s edition, referring to osteoarthritis instead of osteoporosis. Despite a lot of work, we can’t even come up with a decent excuse.

Former smokers need cancer screening

New guidelines from the American Cancer Society suggest that more smokers and former smokers be screened for lung cancer, and that screening begin earlier.

The change from the ACS’s 2013 guidelines now say that anyone with a “≥20 pack-year smoking history” — i.e., about a pack a day — should consider an annual low-dose CT scan starting at age 50 instead of 55.

It doesn’t matter how long it’s been since they quit, either. The new recommendation would mean about 5 million additional Americans should get those scans.

Attention, pharmacy techs!

The last chance to get your GPhA immunization certificate is coming up! In other words, you really want to sign up for GPhA’s Immunization Delivery Training for Pharmacy Technicians.

In short, having this certificate on your résumé will help you stand out from your peers when it comes to looking your boss in the eye. (No offense, peers.) It’ll also help you sit for PTCB’s Advanced Skill Exam.

Help your career and maybe your bank account. Check out GPhA’s Immunization Delivery Training for Pharmacy Technicians — the live portion is Sunday, December 3.

Where’s the government when you need it?

Not happy with how private industry has responded to nationwide drug shortages, two high-ranking GOP representatives want answers from the FDA about why the government hasn’t done more.

They want the FDA to make it easier for domestic companies to get generic drugs into production, and they want the agency to find a way reduce America’s reliance on foreign-made medicine. (It’s not clear how reducing overseas drug imports would help alleviate the shortages.)

The problem, as FDA Commissioner Robert Califf pointed out, is that there’s little incentive for domestic manufacturing of generic drugs. “[W]e essentially have two drug industries in the US,” he said in August.

He cited an “innovator industry” of branded drugs where “the prices are too high,” and the generics industry, where “a lot of the prices are too low.”

And there’s little the FDA can do. As the director of the its Oncology Center of Excellence pointed out, the agency can’t require a company to manufacture a drug or even report spikes in demand. And, of course, even streamlining the approval process won’t help if there’s not enough incentive for a domestic company to make the drug.

Virus-checking arrivals

The CDC is going to be testing incoming travelers at four major airports^*, looking for respiratory viruses. It won’t stop people from entering the country, but it’s going to help the agency get a better handle on how Covid, the flu, and RSV are spreading and on any new variants beginning to spread. (It’s entirely voluntary.)

^* JFK, SFO, Boston’s Logan, and Washington’s Dulles airports

Spicy brain boost

People over 60 who consume 6-(Methylsulfinyl)hexyl isothiocyanate seem to have improved cognitive function.

How do you get 6-MSITC? From wasabi.

The study out of Japan’s Tohoku University was a small one — 72 people aged 60+ over 12 weeks. Interestingly, the ‘wasabi’ group was given tablets, so they didn’t get to enjoy the full effect of 100 mg of wasabi^*. Still…

At the end of the experiment, those who had ingested wasabi tablets showed significantly better performance in their episodic memory (recalling events from the past) and working memory (holding information temporarily) based on a series of cognitive tests.

^* About 1/16th of a teaspoon or 1.25 Wilhelm screams