Coexisting Addiction and Pain in People Receiving Methadone for Addiction.

Coexisting Addiction and Pain in People Receiving Methadone for Addiction.

West J Nurs Res. 2013 Jul 15;
Marie BS

The aim of this qualitative study was to examine the narratives of people who experience chronic pain (lasting 6 months or more) and were receiving methadone for the treatment of their opiate addiction through a major methadone clinic. This paper featured the pathway of how the participants developed chronic pain and addiction, and their beliefs of how prescription opioids would impact their addiction in the future. Thirty-four participants who experienced chronic pain and received methadone for treatment of opiate addiction were willing to tell the story of their experiences. The findings in three areas are presented: (a) whether participants experienced addiction first or pain first and how their exposures to addictive substances influenced their experiences, (b) the significance of recreational drug use and patterns of abuse behaviors leading to chronic pain, and (c) participants’ experiences and beliefs about the potential for abuse of prescription opioid used for treatment of pain. HubMed – drug

Protein-free efavirenz concentrations in cerebrospinal fluid and blood plasma are equivalent: applying the law of mass action to predict protein-free drug concentration.

Antimicrob Agents Chemother. 2013 Aug; 57(8): 4095
Avery LB, Sacktor N, McArthur JC, Hendrix CW

HubMed – drug

The Efficacy and Safety of FSK0808, Filgrastim Biosimilar: A Multicenter, Non-randomized Study in Japanese Patients with Breast Cancer.

Jpn J Clin Oncol. 2013 Jul 14;
Sagara Y, Sato K, Fukuma E, Higaki K, Mizutani M, Osaki A, Takano T, Tokuda Y, Ohno S, Masuda N, Suzuki M, Saeki T

FSK0808 is a filgrastim biosimilar. This study assessed the efficacy and safety of FSK0808 in patients with breast cancer.One hundred and four breast cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy were enrolled in the study. FSK0808 was used to treat the neutropenia experienced by the patients in the course of their chemotherapy. Efficacy was evaluated by the recovery of absolute neutrophil count following FSK0808 administration based on the duration of neutropenia in patients who received pre- or postoperative chemotherapy containing fluorouracil, epirubicin and cyclophosphamide. Adverse events were evaluated in accordance with the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events version 3.0. The incidence of febrile neutropenia and generation of an anti-granulocyte colony-stimulating factor antibody were also evaluated.The average duration of neutropenia in Cycle 2 was 2.2 days with a standard deviation of 1.5 days. The upper limit of the 97.5% one-sided confidence interval was 2.5 days and was confirmed not to exceed 3.0 days, which was defined as the threshold value of absolute neutrophil count recovery. The incidence of febrile neutropenia across all treatment cycles was 34.6%. Observed adverse drug reactions with an incidence of >5% were back pain (60.6%), bone pain (9.6%), alanine aminotransferase increase (8.7%), aspartate aminotransferase increase (5.8%) and arthralgia (5.8%). Production of the anti-granulocyte colony-stimulating factor antibody was not observed in any patient during the study.FSK0808 was safe and well tolerated in breast cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy and effectively stimulated neutrophil recovery. HubMed – drug