Duloxetine in the treatment of stress urinary incontinence.

Stress urinary incontinence (SUI) is the most common form of urinary incontinence and occurs more frequently in women than in men. Duloxetine is a balanced dual serotonin (5-HT) and norepinephrine (NE) reuptake inhibitor and shows no relevant binding affinity for histaminergic, dopaminergic, cholinergic, and adrenergic receptors. The efficacy of duloxetine in SUI is based on the inhibition of the presynaptic reuptake of 5-HT and NE in Onuf's nucleus of the sacral spinal cord, whereby it may increase the concentration of 5-HT and NE in the synaptic cleft.

Duloxetine: mechanism of action at the lower urinary tract and Onuf's nucleus.

Urinary incontinence is the inability to willingly control bladder voiding. Stress urinary incontinence (SUI) is the most frequently occurring type of incontinence in women. No widely accepted or approved drug therapy is yet available for the treatment of stress urinary incontinence.

Laboratory monitoring of heparin and the combination of heparin and the platelet glycoprotein IIb/IIIa receptor antibody fragment abciximab (c7E3) in patients undergoing percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty (PTCA).

Background: Previous studies in patients undergoing percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty (PTCA) have restricted laboratory monitoring to the activated clotting time (ACT). It remains unknown whether the ACT-prolonging effect of abciximab is clinically equivalent to a comparable degree of anti-coagulation by heparin.

Patients And Methods: 30 patients undergoing PTCA received 100 IU of heparin/kg body weight.

Moxonidine treatment of hypertensive patients with advanced renal failure.

Objectives: To compare safety and tolerability of moxonidine versus nitrendipine in hypertensive patients with renal failure. A secondary endpoint was to test whether the sympatholytic drug moxonidine slows decline of renal function when added to standard therapy with an angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitor or AT(1) receptor antagonist plus loop diuretic.

Design: This prospective, randomized, double-blind, multicenter study recruited 177 patients with advanced renal failure receiving antihypertensive standard therapy at outpatient clinics in Germany and Hungary.

Prospective evaluation of early abciximab and primary percutaneous intervention for patients with ST elevation myocardial infarction complicated by cardiogenic shock: results of the REO-SHOCK trial.

Objective: Patients with acute myocardial infarction complicated by cardiogenic shock have a high mortality despite the use of early reperfusion therapies with thrombolysis or percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). Therefore, there is still need to evaluate therapy strategies in these patients.

Design: The REO-SHOCK trial was a prospective, non-randomized study, aimed at evaluation of a routine strategy of early abciximab and PCI in a high-risk group of acute ST elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) patients with cardiogenic shock.