Alyne da Silva Portela

Prescrição médica: orientações adequadas para o uso de medicamentos?

O conhecimento insuficiente de informacao dada ao paciente durante a consulta medica resulta em grandes dificuldades para a conducao correta da terapeutica medicamentosa. Baseados nesse contexto, o estudo teve como objetivo avaliar o grau de conhecimento dos pacientes sobre os medicamentos prescritos na Atencao Basica no municipio de Esperanca (PB). Para tal, foram entrevistadas 199 pessoas que, apos consulta medica, receberam prescricao, tendo sido avaliado o nivel de conhecimento desses pacientes em relacao ao nome do medicamento, a dose, o horario, a finalidade, o tempo de uso e reacoes desagradaveis. Entre os entrevistados, 53,8% evidenciaram desconhecer o nome do medicamento, 20,3% a dosagem e 25,4% o horario de utilizacao. O item em que se observou maior frequencia de acerto foi finalidade do medicamento, tendo 75,1% dos pacientes apresentado bom conhecimento. No que se refere ao tempo de uso e as reacoes desagradaveis, 57,4% e 94,4% dos pacientes, respectivamente, nao possuiam nenhuma informacao correta. Os resultados sugerem que a maioria dos pacientes nao apresenta o conhecimento adequado e seguro para a utilizacao dos medicamentos prescritos.

Compatibility study between lipoic acid with polymers used in controlled drug release systems

Lipoic acid is derived from octanoic acid and is considered a universal antioxidant for combating free radicals and regeneration of endogenous antioxidant, as well as acting like an essential cofactor in multienzyme mitochondrial complex. In the pharmaceutical field, the polymers are among used excipients in pharmaceutical technology, especially in therapies controlled release of drugs. The aim of this study was to evaluate the drug–excipient compatibility between the AL and excipients used in controlled release drug delivery systems. To investigate the possible interactions between substances, was initially performed one screening with differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) to detect possible interactions, and analyses were performed by infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) to confirm the possible interactions. Based on the results of DSC and FTIR was found to be incompatible only with PVP-K30. Based on these results, we can conclude that the analytical tools used in this study are effective for defining incompatibilities between drugs and pharmaceutical excipients in order to ensure a new formulation with well-defined parameters of quality control and stability.

The correlation between anthropometric measurements and biochemical cardiovascular risk markers in the hypertensive elderly

OBJECTIVES This study was aimed at correlating anthropometric markers indicating additional cardiovascular risk in a hypertensive elderly population enrolled in the HIPERDIA programme in Campina Grande, Paraíba, Brazil, South America. METHODS The sample consisted of 131 hypertensive elderly people aged60 to 92 (25.9 % males and 74.1 % females). A socioeconomic, demographic, life-style questionnaire was used in the assessment. Information about anthropometry measurements and pathology frequency were also recorded via this questionnaire. Pearsons correlation, descriptive statistics, comparison between anthropometric variables by gender using Students t-test and one-way ANOVA were used in the analysis for comparing groups by age(60 to 69, 70 to 79 and > 80 years). RESULTS 14.7 % of men and 24.7 % of women were overweight and 11.8 % of men and 21.6 % of women were obese. 57.0 % of women and 26.5 % of men had inadequate values in waist-to-hip ratio analysis. 95.9 % of women and 52.9 % of men had high risk and 95.9 % of women and 38.2 % of men had high abdominal circumference values regarding waistline measurement. After selection (n=40) for correcting potential confounders, it was found that 27 subjects had high C-reactive protein values, an additional cardiovascular risk factor. CONCLUSIONS The results suggested that additional cardiovascular risk could be demonstrated by the high prevalence of being overweight and central obesity presented by the population and the presence of subclinical inflammation amongst hypertensive ones.