The adrenal glands-which are also called suprarenal glands-are part of the endocrine system and are found on the top of each kidney. How the endocrine system hormones work Hormones secreted from glands of the endocrine system travel in the bloodstream to target cells. Target cells have receptors that are specific to each hormone. The hormones and receptors...
Read MoreRight To Try: Needed Legislation or Snake Oil?
Thirty-eight states in the US have passed “Right To Try” laws. These are laws that are created to give terminally ill patients who have run out of options access to experimental drugs that have not completed the FDA approval process. There is an effort underway to pass this type of legislation on a federal level. On February 8, the #LCSM (Lung...
Read MoreSCAD and Heart Facts Infographic
This week, the American Heart Association put out its first Scientific Statement on SCAD-spontaneous coronary artery dissection. “Spontaneous coronary artery dissection (SCAD) has emerged as an important cause of acute coronary syndrome, myocardial infarction, and sudden death, particularly among young women and individuals with few conventional...
Read MoreMore on Insulin: Insulin Replacement Therapy
Insulin was first extracted from cattle and pig pancreas. It took 8,000 pounds of pancreas from 23,500 animals to make one pound of insulin. In 1978, Eli Lilly needed 56 million animals to meet the US demand for insulin. Everything changed when, Genentech used recombinant DNA technology to create synthetic human insulin (now called human insulin). The...
Read MoreWhat’s going on with the price of Insulin?
And the prices of other medications in the US Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disease. That means that the person’s immune system attacks and destroys the cells in the pancreas (beta cells) that make insulin. Once those cells are destroyed, they don’t grow back. Type 1 diabetes is usually diagnosed in young people, before the age of 30, and most often...
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