Deaths more common on popular heart drug: study

By Genevra Pittman

NEW YORK | Wed Nov 28, 2012 8:42am EST
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - People with a common type of abnormal heart rhythm were more likely to die within several years if they had been prescribed digoxin, a drug used to help control abnormal heart rates, in a new analysis.The research involved 4,060 people with atrial fibrillation, in which the heart's upper chambers quiver chaotically instead of contracting normally. More than two-thirds of the participants were treated with digoxin at some point either shortly before or during the 3.5-year study.
Dr. Samy Claude Elayi, from the University of Kentucky in Lexington, said digoxin - which is widely available in generic form - may benefit some people who have heart failure in addition to a heart arrhythmia.
"But in patients that have no heart failure and (have) atrial fibrillation, I think there is no reason to use this drug as a first line," added Elayi, who worked on the study.
Another cardiology researcher, however, said the new study isn't robust enough to warrant changing treatment strategies, and that earlier studies have shown digoxin is safe.
Elayi and his colleagues re-analyzed data from a past trial of people with atrial fibrillation and a high risk of stroke that were treated with a variety of drug combinations, including beta blockers and calcium channel blockers.
Over the study period, 666 people died, according to results published in the European Heart Journal.
People who had taken digoxin in the previous six months, the study team found, were 41 percent more likely to die of any cause and 61 percent more likely to die from a heart rhythm problem, in particular.
That increased risk of death was seen in people with and without heart failure, and in both men and women.
DIZZINESS, FAINTING
Digoxin works by helping to stabilize the upper heart chambers affected by atrial fibrillation, Elayi said - but it can also cause problems by creating a bad rhythm in the heart's lower chambers. That can lead to dizziness, fainting and heart palpitations.
The researchers noted that they didn't have data on what dose of digoxin people were prescribed - or how closely they stuck to those prescriptions.
Because the trial wasn't originally intended to measure the negative effects of digoxin, and people weren't assigned randomly to one arm or the other, the analysis also can't prove that digoxin caused the extra deaths.
Dr. Ali Ahmed, who has studied digoxin at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, called that a major limitation of the new study.
He said an earlier randomized controlled trial - considered the gold standard of medical research - did not find more deaths among people with heart failure taking digoxin. Other research, Ahmed added, has suggested that low doses of the drug can actually lower the risk of death among some patients.
An analysis like this one can't fully account for the likelihood that sicker patients are prescribed certain drugs more often, he said.
"When you do non-randomized studies, you always wonder, was it really digoxin or was it the other confounders" such as patients' chronic diseases, that led to more deaths.
"This should be taken with extreme caution, because of the potential for confounding and bias from a variety of sources," Ahmed, who wasn't involved in the new research, told Reuters Health.
"The fundamental thing is you cannot overrule the findings of a randomized controlled trial with non-randomized data."
'NOT A KILLER'
Digoxin can be bought for about $10 for a month's supply. It's been used worldwide for decades to help control heart rate, the researchers said.
Elayi said the findings don't mean that people with heart failure and atrial fibrillation shouldn't be taking the drug.
But based on his team's study, he said he would recommend other heart medications before digoxin for people without heart failure. However, if an atrial fibrillation patient also has very low blood pressure - which makes drugs such as beta blockers and calcium blockers unsafe - digoxin might be a reasonable second choice, he added.
In that case, doctors should prescribe digoxin at low doses and keep a close watch on the amount of the drug in patients' blood, Elayi told Reuters Health.
In addition, he said, "From the patient perspective, if doctors put them on the drug they should check their rationale for that."
But according to Ahmed, patients and doctors shouldn't worry about taking or prescribing the drug because of this study. Digoxin, he said, "is not a killer."
SOURCE: bit.ly/99ohTH European Heart Journal, online November 27, 2012.


My Opinion:

as I was reading the first part stuck out to me I learned in psychology that when scientists do studies they are suppose to cause no harm to patients and in the article it said "Over the study period, 666 people died"....that is harm to the patient. Then the article goes on to say "People who had taken digoxin in the previous six months, the study team found, were 41 percent more likely to die of any cause and 61 percent more likely to die from a heart rhythm problem, in particular." Im sorry but these studies of this drug are killing people and the drug should not be used anymore. The drug Digoxin is said that it suppose to "stabilize the upper heart chambers affected by atrial fibrillation" but the problem is that it is creating a bad rhthym in the hearts lower chambers. On the other hand as i kept reading I saw that people who have low blood pressure and atrial fibrillation could possible be helpful and not cause harm. Im sure there are and will be more studies on this drug and it will keep selling or stop depending on researchers findings.

5 Tips to Win Powerball Jackpot

By ABC News

• Posts

By ABC News | ABC News Blogs – Mon, Nov 26, 2012

 

 

 

 

 

 

ABC News' Sharyn Alfonsi reports:

With a $425 million Powerball jackpot now up for grabs Wednesday night, people are lining up across the country with dreams of money, money, money.

"[I] really want that Powerball," Tony Hanson of Georgia said.

In 2006, eight meatpacking workers - called the "Nebraska 8? - struck gold in Lincoln, Neb., with a single ticket chosen by a computer. They won $365 million - the biggest lottery payout in U.S. history.

Seven of the eight winners still live in Lincoln. One person lives an hour away in Omaha.

"They really haven't changed that much at all," said Eric Zornes, one of the Nebraska 8.
Michael Terpstra took a $15 million lump sum and bought an unassuming $470,000 home.
Single lady Chastity Rutjens got married a few years ago to Rob Stewart, another one of the lucky eight. His ex-wife got half of his earnings.
Dave Gehle, a sanitation supervisor, showed up to work for three weeks after he won.
"We couldn't just leave them in a bind," he told ABC News.
Gehle said he took several vacations, bought a Nissan and sold his two-bedroom home for a house with three bedrooms.
Quang Dao, a refugee from Vietnam, used his money in Vietnam, where he built homes for his children.
It was covered in the documentary "Lucky." He now lives a simple, yet slightly more lavish life in Lincoln. His wife still grows her own vegetables.

For Americans hoping to score big like the Nebraska 8, experts shared these tips with ABC News today:

Quick Picks and personal numbers have the same chance of winning - one in 175 million.

The only way to increase the chances of winning the Powerball is to buy more tickets.

However, the more people buy tickets, the worse a person's chances get.

Search for lotteries that have smaller jackpots because they cause smaller frenzies.

Stay away from common lucky numbers like 3, 7 and 11 as well as numbers under 31 because they could be popular calendar dates like birthdays and anniversaries and would mean sharing the jackpot.

My Opinion:

Winning the jackpot for them men must have been so amazing and for the man from Vietnam that built houses for his children was a very generous thing. I always figured if i won the like The florida PowerBall i would build a homeless shelter that offered education and a place to eat and seep. Then I would pay my parents debt off and build them a new house they would really love and buy my parents ne cars that they knew they could rely on to get them from point A to point B with no problems. I've always wanted to build my grandma carlisle a nice hom to because she has always struggled and is a very sweet lady and deserves it. I would be sograteful to win because my parents really need the help and i would pay everything off for them and give them more and same for my other family like my little cousin for muscular dystrophy i would do as much as i could to keep him alive for as long as possible, he really deserves it especially because he is still such a happy little boy with a loving family.

Enlarge Photo

Man says prayer group leader told him to kill wife

By BILL DRAPER | Associated Press – 2 hrs 57 mins ago

Associated Press/The Kansas City Star, Keith Myers, File - FILE - In this Nov. 13, 2012, file photo, Micah Moore, 23, right, is escorted into the Jackson County Courthouse Annex in Independence, Mo., for his …more murder charge in the death of 27-year-old Bethany Ann Deaton. Moore is scheduled for a preliminary hearing on a first-degree murder charge Wednesday, Nov. 28, 2012. (AP Photo/The Kansas City Star, Keith Myers, File) less

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Less than three months after he stood as a groomsman in the wedding of two friends he had known since college in Texas, Micah Moore walked into a suburban Kansas City police department and unloaded a dark secret: He had taken the woman's life at the request of her new husband, a charismatic prayer group leader.

Police said Bethany Deaton's death initially appeared to be a suicide. Officers found a note and empty bottle of over-the-counter pain medication along with her body in a minivan parked by a lake on Oct. 30.

It wasn't until Moore confessed nearly two weeks later that police announced she had been killed. He is scheduled for a preliminary hearing on a first-degree murder charge Wednesday.
In the criminal complaint filed in support of the charge, police detailed a stunning series of allegations that Moore made as part of his confession.

Moore, 23, lived with Deaton and her husband, Tyler, in a communal home shared by male members of their prayer group. He told police that several members had sexually assaulted Bethany Deaton and that they were worried she would tell someone. Moore said that's when Tyler Deaton ordered him to kill Bethany Deaton, according to a criminal complaint.

Tyler Deaton has not been charged in his wife's death. Jackson County prosecutor Jean Peters Baker said Deaton was under investigation but declined to elaborate. Deaton does not have a listed phone number and did not respond to requests for comment The Associated Press made through Facebook and phone and email messages to his father.
Moore's attorney, Melanie Morgan, declined to comment.

Tyler and Bethany Deaton moved to Kansas City in 2009 from Texas to attend a six-month internship at the non-accredited International House of Prayer University. The two had met as freshmen at Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas, in 2005, and two years later Tyler started a prayer group, a former longtime member of the group told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because he was afraid of retaliation from Tyler Deaton.

Tyler Deaton was listed at one point as a division coordinator for IHOPU's "friendship groups," but the school said that was a mistake. It issued a statement distancing itself from Tyler Deaton after Moore, a student at IHOPU, was arrested.

"Since Bethany's death it has come to light that over five years ago, both she and Mr. Moore joined an independent, close-knit, religious group in Georgetown, Texas," the school said in a statement. "This religious group of fewer than 20 people was led by Tyler Deaton. They relocated to Kansas City over the last few years and operated under a veil of secrecy."

IHOPU is the educational arm of International House of Prayer of Kansas City, an evangelical Christian group focused on missions and preparation for the end of time.

The Deatons' prayer group had at least two houses, with women living in one and men in another. Bethany Deaton, 27, moved into the men's house with Tyler Deaton after they married in August.

According to the criminal complaint, Moore told police that men in the house began drugging Bethany Deaton and sexually assaulting her soon after she moved in. He said she was seeing a therapist and group members became concerned she would tell the therapist about the assaults.

Moore and other men who lived in the house told police that several group members also were having sexual relations with Tyler Deaton, unbeknownst to his wife. One man, whose name was blacked out of the criminal complaint, told police that Tyler Deaton said after Bethany Deaton died that he had had a dream he killed his wife by suffocating her.

Moore told detectives Tyler Deaton instructed him to kill Bethany Deaton because he knew Moore had it in him to do it, and that Moore reported back to Tyler Deaton after she was dead. Moore told police that he had placed a bag over Bethany Deaton's head and held it there until her body shook.

my opinion:

Wow the first thing that comes to mind is that men, not all but some, are very cruel. another thing that comes to mind is tha sometimes forming groups can be a very bad idea because they start creating sort of rules and weird ways of lives and unusual beliefs. Such as when they formed their group IHOPU and had two houses men and women but when Bethany Deaton moved in the drugged and raped her, multiple men....imagaine how thet ruined her life and then she had a bag held over her face until she ran out of oxygen, started shaking and died, imagine what she she was thinking while slowlly and painfully dying. All of them men should be put in jail for rape and he husband Tyler Deaton and friend Moore should be put in jail for rape and murder. yes Tyler was her husband but to drug her and have sex with her was against her will and is rape. and yes Tyler did not kill her but he was an accomplice and Bethany might still be alive if her Tyler Deaton did not tell Moore to kill her.

blogpost 11

Flu During Pregnancy Linked To Autism Risk

11/13/2012 11:30 AM ET

Mothers who suffer from the flu during their pregnancy may put their children at an increased risk of autism, says a new study from researchers at Denmark's University of Aarhus. For the study lead researcher Hjordis Osk Atladottir and colleagues examined the health records of children born in Denmark between 1997 and 2002.

They found that women who reported having the flu during pregnancy were twice as likely to have child that displayed signs of autism at or before the age of three:

"Our findings are interesting for research purposes, but they should not alarm women who are pregnant," Atladottir in a news release. "It needs to be emphasized that around 98% of the women in this study who experienced influenza or fever or took antibiotics during pregnancy did not have children with autism."

The data was published this week in the journal Pediatrics.

by RTT Staff Writer

my opinion

i don't think the flu during pregnancy is linked to autism risk.it says in the article its self "98% of the women in this study who experienced influenza or fever or took antibiotics during pregnancy did not have children with autism." i think there is another factor that links the other 2% of women together. that 2% of women could have been through something or done something that caused autism. 98% is just to big of a number so i believe the flu is not related to women having kids with autism.

blogpost 10

Woman Hit, Killed by 19-Yr-Old Drunk Driver on Skid Row IDed

Skid Row (Photo by Shabdro Photo via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr)

One of the two homeless people who were struck, dragged and killed by a car on Skid Row Sunday have been identified.

Teryl Ann Sageser, 51, and a 50-year-old man, whose name has been withheld pending notification of relatives, were run over by a 1989 Mercedes around 12:05 a.m. Sunday while sleeping on the sidewalk. The driver of the Mercedes, 19-year-old Carmen Elena Chavez of Los Angeles, lost control of the vehicle while making a right turn at an unsafe speed near Crocker and Fourth streets.

The vehicle "ran off the road, hit the building, went down the sidewalk and ran over two people sleeping on the sidewalk," Los Angeles Police Department Sgt. Steve Bailey told City News Service. Bailey added, "Speed is definitely going to be a factor in this one, because from the time they hit the building until the car came to rest it covered 50 feet." KTLA reports that both victims were dragged along with the car until it stopped.

Chavez and her passengers—one woman and two men—ran from the vehicle following the crash, but both women and one man later returned to the scene and were promptly taken into custody for questioning by police.

After failing her field sobriety test at the scene, Chavez was arrested and booked on suspicion of two counts each of vehicular manslaughter and drunk driving. She was being held in lieu of $100,000 bail.

my opinion

The women driving the car should defiantly be taken to jail. she shouldn't have been drunk driving and she defiantly shouldn't of been speeding. on top of that she and her passengers should not have run away that was really disrespectful. Chavez should be charged with drunk driving and vehicular manslaughter.