Current Medicinal Chemistry - Volume 21, Issue 27, 2014

In adult patients, cardiovascular drugs are widely administered in the treatment of numerous diseases. The indications and doses are strictly codified by international Guidelines, which are periodically updated by the American and European Societies of Cardiology. In paediatric patients, however, the situation is substantially different. The lack of large interventional studies on the use of these compounds has led to a grea Read More

During the last decades, the introduction of new, more efficient drugs, has significantly improved the heart failure (HF) therapy of adults. Therapeutic focus has shifted from simple hemodynamic manipulation to include neurohumoral modulation as a consequence of the better understanding of mechanisms of HF formation, in particular at the cellular level. The aetiologies of HF in children are remarkably differe Read More

Similarly to a series of chronic diseases, essential arterial hypertension (HTN) may be manifested during childhood as a blood pressure (BP) reading which repeatedly rises above the 95th percentile of population-specific standards. Since BP tends to track along the same percentiles throughout life, children with higher BPs are more likely to become hypertensive adults. When healthy measures aimed at reducing BP (i.e. body we Read More

The primary objective of this review is to verify if there are differences in the diagnostic and therapeutic strategies in cases of PDA employed in different NICUs that might help explain the different percentages of duct closure, surgical ligation and outcome in these vulnerable patients. The secondary objective is to document if the selection of a specific NSAID and/or the way of administration are based on factors such as co Read More

Infantile hemangiomas (IHs) are the most common benign tumors of infancy and usually they don't require specific therapy. In 10-20% of cases IHs are able to generate complication and medical/surgical intervention is needed. For many decades standard treatment consisted in oral or intralesional corticosteroids until Leaute-Labreze and colleagues published the first report on the efficacy of propranolol for cutaneous in Read More

Objective: evaluate the relationship between impaired growth during intrauterine life and adult risk of cardiovascular disease and death. Materials: review of the most important contributions to the relationship between intrauterine fetal life and heart disease insurgence in childhood and adulthood, starting with a schematic representation of the principal steps in human heart development, discussion of the new theory on Read More

Multiple myeloma is the second most hematological malignancy, accounting for more than 10% of all blood cancers and 2% of annual cancer-related deaths due to lack of curable drugs. Novel and molecularly targeted anti-MM drugs are in urgent need. The phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3K)/AKT signaling pathway plays a critical regulatory role in multiple myeloma pathophysiology, including survival, proliferation, migra Read More

Herein, we present an overview of the historic development of drugs for the treatment of Parkinson’s disease as well as prospective novel treatment forms based on targeting the dopamine and adenosine receptors. The review includes the development of levodopa, a precursor of the neurotransmitter dopamine, which to date is the most commonly prescribed and most effective drug for controlling the motor symptom Read More