Development and Pharmacokinetics of a Novel Acetylsalicylic Acid Dry Powder for Pulmonary Administration

Aspirin is an historic blockbuster product, and it has been proposed in a wide range of formulas. Due to exacerbation risks, the pulmonary route has been seldom considered as an alternative to conventional treatments. Only recently, owing to overt advantages, inhalable acetylsalicylic acid dry powders (ASA DPI) began to be considered as an option. In this work, we developed a novel highly performing inhalable ASA DPI using a nano spray-drying technique and leucine as an excipient and evaluated its pharmacokinetics compared with oral administration. The formulation obtained showed remarkable respirability and quality features. Serum and lung ASA DPI profiles showed faster presentation in blood and higher retention compared with oral administration. The dry powder was superior to the DPI suspension. The relative bioavailability in serum and lungs claimed superiority of ASA DPI over oral administration, notwithstanding a fourfold lower pulmonary dose. The obtained ASA DPI formulation shows promising features for the treatment of inflammatory and infectious lung pathologies.

Response to the COVID-19 pandemic in the legally deprived population of liberty in Cali (Colombia)

 

With the COVID-19 pandemic, the challenge of reducing the transmission of the disease has led to new challenges in decision-making. The vulnerability of persons deprived of liberty led to the design of contagion mitigation alternatives. Since February 2020, at the Villahermosa Penitentiary and Prison Center in Cali, the Secretaría de Salud Pública (SSP) began a series of actions that intensified on March 11, when the WHO declared COVID -19 as a pandemic. The SSP, in an articulated work; configured a series of strategies aimed at mitigating the impact and speed of contagion, infectious disease doctors and internists were also summoned who provided recommendations and contributed to decision-making. An intervention model was designed, which was guided by two main processes: promotion and prevention actions and service provision actions. The articulated work and the high commitment of the actors involved, the development of strategies for biosecurity, hygiene, isolation, rapid detection, and, above all, immediate control of symptoms and medical care on-site with adjustments that allowed managing patients inside the institution; It has meant that to date mortality is below 1% and that for the time being the situation is under control.

Key messages

• The humanization of health service provision is essential to achieve effective results.

• The rapid and articulated responses made it possible to maintain a mortality of less than 1% in this population.

Does exposure to GSM 900 MHz mobile phone radiation affect short-term memory of elementary school students?

BACKGROUND

Now-a-days, children are exposed to mobile phone radiation at a very early age. We have previously shown that a large proportion of children in the city of Shiraz, Iran use mobile phones. Furthermore, we have indicated that the visual reaction time (VRT) of university students was significantly affected by a 10 min real/sham exposure to electromagnetic fields emitted by mobile phone. We found that these exposures decreased the reaction time which might lead to a better response to different hazards. We have also revealed that occupational exposures to radar radiations decreased the reaction time in radar workers. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether short-term exposure of elementary school students to radiofrequency (RF) radiation leads to changes in their reaction time and short-term memory.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

A total of 60 elementary school children ages ranging from 8 to 10 years studying at a public elementary school in Shiraz, Iran were enrolled in this study. Standardized computer-based tests of VRT and short-term memory (modified for children) were administered. The students were asked to perform some preliminary tests for orientation with the VRT test. After orientation, to reduce the random variation of measurements, each test was repeated ten times in both real and sham exposure phases. The time interval between the two subsequent sham and real exposure phases was 30 min.

RESULTS

The mean ± standard deviation reaction times after a 10 min talk period and after a 10 min sham exposure (switched off mobile) period were 249.0 ± 82.3 ms and 252.9 ± 68.2 ms (P = 0.629), respectively. On the other hand, the mean short-term memory scores after the talk and sham exposure periods were 1062.60 ± 305.39, and 1003.84 ± 339.68 (P = 0.030), respectively.

CONCLUSION

To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to show that short-term exposure of elementary school students to RF radiation leads to the better performance of their short-term memory.

Characterization of human pericardial macrophages

This paper deals with the study of the cell population in 13 samples of normal human pericardial fluid. Large mononuclear cells (LMC) constituted 74.1 +/- 18.5% of the total cell population. These LMC possess the characteristics of macrophages firm adherence to glass intracytoplasmic presence of vimentin without keratin, ultrastructural observation of a lysosomal apparatus cytoenzymatic activities: acid phosphatases, naphthol AS.D acetate esterase and peroxidases, and phagocytosis of Baker's yeasts. All these data clearly show that macrophages are the main component of the pericardial fluid cell population and can be of great significance in the defense mechanisms and physiology of the pericardial space.