An Assessment of Service-Learning in 34 US Schools of Pharmacy Follow Up on the 2001 Professional Affairs Committee Report.

Objective. To determine if the service-learning components used at a convenience sample of schools and colleges of pharmacy meet the intent of the 2001 AACP Professional Affairs Committee (PAC) report. Methods.

Neuroprotective actions of the ginseng extract G115 in two rodent models of Parkinson's disease.

The herbal remedy, ginseng, has recently been demonstrated to possess neurotrophic and neuroprotective properties, which may be useful in preventing various forms of neuronal cell loss including the nigrostriatal degeneration seen in Parkinson's disease (PD). In these studies, we examine the potential neuroprotective actions of the ginseng extract, G115, in two rodent models of PD. Animals received oral administration of G115 prior to and/or following exposure to the parkinsonism-inducing neurotoxin, 1-methyl-4-phenyl-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine (MPTP), in mice, or its toxic metabolite, 1-methyl-4-phenylpyridinium (MPP(+)), in rats.

Acetylator phenotype and genotype in patients infected with HIV: discordance between methods for phenotype determination and genotype.

The acetylator phenotype and genotype of AIDS patients, with and without an acute illness, was compared with that of healthy control subjects (30 per group). Two probe drugs, caffeine and dapsone, were used to determine the phenotype in the acutely ill cohort. Polymerase chain reaction amplification and restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis served to distinguish between the 26 known NAT2 alleles and the 21 most common NAT1 alleles.

Effect of streptolysin-O-on rat hepatic acetyl coenzyme-A: arylamine N-acetyltransferase and cytochrome P-450 2B 1/2 activities ex vivo.

Numerous immunostimulants have been found to increase N-acetylation in vivo but are not associated with a similar increase in vitro. Streptolysin-O (SLO), a thiol-activated (oxygen-labile) hemolytic and immune-stimulating exotoxin produced by group A streptococci, has been reported to increase the metabolic rate constant for sulfamethazine in vivo and arylamine N-acetyltransferase (NAT) activity toward procainamide (PA) ex vivo. The effect of SLO pretreatment of rats on cytochrome P-450-catalyzed tolbutamide hydroxylation and NAT activities toward PA (a substrate for NAT1), and p-aminobenzoic acid (a substrate for NAT2) was examined ex vivo.