RE: HEALTHBEAT: Studies suggest common painkillers mightdelay healing of broken bones

[Guest guest]

Hi all

FYI

just caught a blurb on tv…tonight on abc with peter Jennings is a show

called BITTER MEDICINE…10:00 pm eastern..

what I caught was celebrex and vioxx and a doctor talking about why the

drug has been so successful..BUT that it may be no better than older

drugs…it is the marketing euphoria about these drugs that have taken the

status of these drugs to a status they don’t deserve..

then Charlie gibbons said..arent you biting the hand that feeds you by

running this program seeing as you advertise on your nightly news with

these drugs..

peter Jennings said yes we are but it is what we do..

that is all I caught…perhaps tune in for your personal reasons to see

what they say about BITTER MEDICINE..

Sincerely

[ ] HEALTHBEAT: Studies suggest common painkillers

mightdelay healing of broken bones

HEALTHBEAT: Studies suggest common painkillers might delay healing of

broken

bones

LAURAN NEERGAARD, AP Medical Writer Monday, May 27, 2002

------------------------------------------------------------------------

(05-27) 22:02 PDT WASHINGTON (AP) --

Broke your leg? Some doctors are warning to carefully consider which

painkiller you use.

New research suggests some of the most widely used painkillers may delay

healing of a broken bone -- and one study, albeit in animals, that's

getting

lots of doctors' attention suggests the blockbuster sellers Vioxx and

Celebrex are among the culprits.

There's no proof yet that anti-inflammatory painkillers cause major bone

problems, and the makers of Vioxx and Celebrex deny any link.

But some bone experts call the research compelling enough that doctors

should explain the risk before patients choose a painkiller for a broken

bone, spinal surgery or other bone injury.

" It's time to tell the public, " concludes Dr. Einhorn, Boston

University's orthopedic surgery chairman -- who says he'd choose a mild

narcotic over more common painkillers if he broke a leg.

It's an important question, as more Americans regularly use Vioxx,

Celebrex

and other anti-inflammatory painkillers called NSAIDS that also are

implicated. Doctors increasingly offer bone surgery or fracture patients

higher and higher doses of such painkillers in place of narcotics.

At issue is the discovery that an enzyme called cox-2, which causes pain

and

inflammation, also appears to play a crucial role in bone healing.

Vioxx and Celebrex fight pain by blocking cox-2. They're wildly popular

because they're easier on the stomach than the older NSAIDs that block,

to

varying degrees, both cox-2 and the related cox-1 enzyme. NSAIDS range

from

ibuprofen to hospital-used indomethacin and Toradol.

Researchers at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey

gave

253 young rats with a splinted broken leg either Vioxx, Celebrex,

indomethacin or no drug.

Indomethacin-treated rats took a week longer to heal than untreated

rats;

the resulting bone was as strong.

But rats given Vioxx or Celebrex hadn't fully healed after two months --

and

what new bone formed sometimes was only a weakened shell, researcher J.

O'Connor reports in this month's Journal of Bone and Mineral

Research.

O'Connor then tested mice engineered to not produce any cox-2. Their

fractures also didn't heal normally.

A flurry of additional studies suggests any NSAID, not just cox-2

inhibitors, hinders bone healing, Einhorn cautions. How much? That's far

from clear -- a week or several. So delay might bother some people, not

others.

" If it were my fracture ... to me every day counts, " he says.

O'Connor says his findings prompted some colleagues to withhold cox-2

inhibitors from broken-bone patients. The American Academy of Orthopedic

Surgeons just alerted all its members to the study. And the Arthritis

Foundation's medical director urges more research to see if people

really

are at risk -- but meanwhile says patients should discuss with their

doctors

if they should temporarily quit any anti-inflammatory painkiller until a

broken bone heals.

There are few human studies. But surgeons made the surprise discovery a

few

years ago that high doses of the intravenous NSAID Toradol delays spinal

surgery healing, and a recent British study concluded using NSAIDS was

the

biggest factor in delayed healing of a broken leg.

No one has examined Vioxx and Celebrex effects on people's broken bones.

But

a recent review of some spinal surgery patients' medical records found

no

healing delay among users of those drugs.

" It is confusing. ... You see this muddy picture, " says Dr. Reuben

of

Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Mass., who conducted that study

--

and calls for targeted research on broken-bone sufferers to settle the

issue.

Why would blocking cox-2 hurt bone?

-2 apparently is important in helping bone-forming stem cells and

growth

factors do their work, says Dr. Regis O'Keefe of the University of

Rochester. He just compared regular mice with those whose bodies don't

make

any cox-1 or any cox-2, and only found a problem with lack of cox-2, he

reports in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.

Giving broken-bone sufferers different painkillers to test for delayed

healing would be unethical, says Einhorn, a paid consultant for Vioxx

maker

Merck & Co. and Celebrex maker Pharmacia Corp. Despite the companies'

displeasure, he concludes " a prudent approach " is to temporarily quit

using

either NSAIDS, Vioxx or Celebrex if you break a bone.

" If you don't know, you should err on the side of caution. "

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi

[Guest guest]

Thanks for mentioning that, . I’ll make sure to see it!

Hope you’re having a pain free day!

Carol in FL

[ ] HEALTHBEAT: Studies suggest common painkillers

mightdelay healing of broken bones

HEALTHBEAT: Studies suggest common painkillers might delay healing of

broken

bones

LAURAN NEERGAARD, AP Medical Writer Monday, May 27, 2002

------------------------------------------------------------------------

(05-27) 22:02 PDT WASHINGTON (AP) --

Broke your leg? Some doctors are warning to carefully consider which

painkiller you use.

New research suggests some of the most widely used painkillers may delay

healing of a broken bone -- and one study, albeit in animals, that's

getting

lots of doctors' attention suggests the blockbuster sellers Vioxx and

Celebrex are among the culprits.

There's no proof yet that anti-inflammatory painkillers cause major bone

problems, and the makers of Vioxx and Celebrex deny any link.

But some bone experts call the research compelling enough that doctors

should explain the risk before patients choose a painkiller for a broken

bone, spinal surgery or other bone injury.

" It's time to tell the public, " concludes Dr. Einhorn, Boston

University's orthopedic surgery chairman -- who says he'd choose a mild

narcotic over more common painkillers if he broke a leg.

It's an important question, as more Americans regularly use Vioxx,

Celebrex

and other anti-inflammatory painkillers called NSAIDS that also are

implicated. Doctors increasingly offer bone surgery or fracture patients

higher and higher doses of such painkillers in place of narcotics.

At issue is the discovery that an enzyme called cox-2, which causes pain

and

inflammation, also appears to play a crucial role in bone healing.

Vioxx and Celebrex fight pain by blocking cox-2. They're wildly popular

because they're easier on the stomach than the older NSAIDs that block,

to

varying degrees, both cox-2 and the related cox-1 enzyme. NSAIDS range

from

ibuprofen to hospital-used indomethacin and Toradol.

Researchers at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey

gave

253 young rats with a splinted broken leg either Vioxx, Celebrex,

indomethacin or no drug.

Indomethacin-treated rats took a week longer to heal than untreated

rats;

the resulting bone was as strong.

But rats given Vioxx or Celebrex hadn't fully healed after two months --

and

what new bone formed sometimes was only a weakened shell, researcher J.

O'Connor reports in this month's Journal of Bone and Mineral

Research.

O'Connor then tested mice engineered to not produce any cox-2. Their

fractures also didn't heal normally.

A flurry of additional studies suggests any NSAID, not just cox-2

inhibitors, hinders bone healing, Einhorn cautions. How much? That's far

from clear -- a week or several. So delay might bother some people, not

others.

" If it were my fracture ... to me every day counts, " he says.

O'Connor says his findings prompted some colleagues to withhold cox-2

inhibitors from broken-bone patients. The American Academy of Orthopedic

Surgeons just alerted all its members to the study. And the Arthritis

Foundation's medical director urges more research to see if people

really

are at risk -- but meanwhile says patients should discuss with their

doctors

if they should temporarily quit any anti-inflammatory painkiller until a

broken bone heals.

There are few human studies. But surgeons made the surprise discovery a

few

years ago that high doses of the intravenous NSAID Toradol delays spinal

surgery healing, and a recent British study concluded using NSAIDS was

the

biggest factor in delayed healing of a broken leg.

No one has examined Vioxx and Celebrex effects on people's broken bones.

But

a recent review of some spinal surgery patients' medical records found

no

healing delay among users of those drugs.

" It is confusing. ... You see this muddy picture, " says Dr. Reuben

of

Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Mass., who conducted that study

--

and calls for targeted research on broken-bone sufferers to settle the

issue.

Why would blocking cox-2 hurt bone?

-2 apparently is important in helping bone-forming stem cells and

growth

factors do their work, says Dr. Regis O'Keefe of the University of

Rochester. He just compared regular mice with those whose bodies don't

make

any cox-1 or any cox-2, and only found a problem with lack of cox-2, he

reports in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.

Giving broken-bone sufferers different painkillers to test for delayed

healing would be unethical, says Einhorn, a paid consultant for Vioxx

maker

Merck & Co. and Celebrex maker Pharmacia Corp. Despite the companies'

displeasure, he concludes " a prudent approach " is to temporarily quit

using

either NSAIDS, Vioxx or Celebrex if you break a bone.

" If you don't know, you should err on the side of caution. "

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi