Scientists in the University of Georgia’s Center for Tropical and Emerging Global Illness have discovered that a more extensive, less frequent drug routines with currently available therapies could cure the infection that causes Chagas illness, a potentially life-threatening illness affecting as much as 300,000 individuals in the United States.
Trypanosoma cruzi is a single-celled parasitic organism that triggers Chagas disease. At least 6 million individuals are infected by T. cruzi, mostly in South America. Current drug therapies have actually been inefficient in completely clearing the infection and are related to severe unfavorable negative effects.
A single dose of benznidazole has actually been shown to be highly effective in eliminating more than 90%of parasites. However, after a CTEGD group discovered some of the parasites participate in a dormancy phase, the researchers assumed that a periodic treatment schedule might be effective.
” In this system we can see what a single dose of drug does,” stated Rick Tarleton, Regents’ Teacher in UGA’s department of cellular biology. “Does it make good sense to give a drug twice daily when the remaining dormant parasites are insensitive to it?”
The detectives discovered that offering as low as two-and-a-half times the typical day-to-day dosage of benznidazole, when weekly for 30 weeks, entirely cleared the infection, whereas offering the standard daily dosage once a week for a longer period did not.
” Existing human trials are only taking a look at offering lower doses over a shorter time period, which is the precise opposite of what we show works,” stated Tarleton.
Since Tarleton’s team dealt with a mouse design, how this modification in treatment programs will equate in people is yet unidentified, as are any possible side effects of the greater dosages. Adverse responses already are an issue
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