In This Issue:

This Week on PeoplesPharmacy.com
Featured Q&A
Featured Home Remedy
Diabetes Drug Still Controversial
Shun Toothpaste With Antifreeze
Coffee Wards Off Liver Cancer
New Drug For Liver Cancer
Don't Count On Shark Cartilage

Best Choices from The People's Pharmacy

We are pleased to announce our new book, Best Choices from The People's Pharmacy. Best Choices From the People's Pharmacy is a how-to for consumers trying to work out which treatments, including diet, home remedies, dietary supplements and drugs, are best for what ails them. Click the link below to purchase a copy at a discount of $21.95 plus $5 shipping and handling!

Note: We are shipping single book orders Media Mail with an expected transit time of 3-9 days from shipment, and orders for two or more books by FedEx Ground. Shipping and handling is $5 per book. We also include a FREE copy of Chocolate without Guilt, regularly $14.95, autographed by Terry, with orders for three of more copies of Best Choices shipped to the same address.

http://ppcart.fountainshosting.com/p-249-best-choices-from-the-peoples-pharmacy.aspx

This Week on PeoplesPharmacy.com:

Extended Audio
To fit the hour-long format of our radio show, we often have to edit down our guest interviews. Sometimes this means leaving out interesting discussion. We hate leaving these discussions on the cutting room floor, and now we can share them with you through our website. From time to time we will post complete, extended interviews on our site.

Click here for the extended interview with Dr. Curt Furberg, who discussed Avandia and the FDA on our June 2 show:
http://www.peoplespharmacy.com/archives/radio_shows/635_health_news_update.asp

Click here for the extended interview with Dr. Lisa Sanders, medical consultant for the TV series "House," who appeared on our May 26 show:
http://www.peoplespharmacy.com/archives/radio_shows/634_the_art_of_diagnosis.asp

This Week's Radio Show:
Experts have been wringing their hands over the epidemic of childhood obesity in this country. Far too many youngsters are developing type-2 diabetes and other complications of being overweight, and nobody seems to know how to address the problem. Lots of kids these days would rather play video games than tag, so exercise is part of the equation. But what are we feeding our children?
http://www.peoplespharmacy.com/archives/radio_shows/636_battling_childhood_obesity.asp

Don't Let Drugs Cause Disability
They say that men are from Mars and women are from Venus. That's because they have such different approaches to life. If that's true, then perhaps physicians are from Oz and patients are still in Kansas. They too have difficulty...
http://www.peoplespharmacy.com/archives/editorial/dont_let_drugs_cause_disability.asp

Red Pepper for Constipation?
Q. I have suffered with constipation for more than a year and have had little success finding relief. Someone suggested that I eat an entire red pepper daily. This certainly does not appeal to me, but I am feeling desperate...
http://www.peoplespharmacy.com/archives/pharmacy_qa/red_pepper_for_constipation.asp

Chocolate for High Blood Pressure?
Q. I have spent more than a year trying one kind of blood pressure medicine after another. I have suffered from all sorts of side effects, including heart palpitations and dizziness but the worst was depression. All I wanted to...
http://www.peoplespharmacy.com/archives/herb_home_remedy_qa/chocolate_for_high_blood_pressure.asp

New Ways to Get Rid of Skin Tags
Q. Some time ago I read in your column about someone who had success removing skin tags with a liquid bandage. I would appreciate hearing about this remedy. I have several of these growths around my neck where the chain...
http://www.peoplespharmacy.com/archives/pharmacy_qa/new_ways_to_get_rid_of_skin_tags.asp

Coconut Saves Patient's Life
Q. I noticed an article on your Web site (www.peoplespharmacy.com) about coconut macaroon cookies stopping diarrhea. I am a hospice nurse, and one of my patients was literally dying of diarrhea. None of the medical treatments were helping. After reading...
http://www.peoplespharmacy.com/archives/herb_home_remedy_qa/coconut_saves_patients_life.asp

Featured Q & A

Is Eye Damage Linked To Photo Flash And Herb?
Q. How can I report an adverse reaction to an herb? I believe St. John's wort caused the vitreous in both my eyes to become burned upon exposure to the blinding flash from an industrial-sized camera used to take my passport photo.

As soon as this flash went off, I immediately saw black stuff in my eyes which was subsequently diagnosed as vitreous floaters. In addition to multiple floaters, I have an area of dulled vision containing two grayish circular spots.

The ophthalmologists I've seen have never heard of a camera flash affecting the vitreous, so they have attributed my floaters to "old age." I'm 33 and never had floaters before this.

Since St. John's wort can cause burns to sun-exposed skin, I think it is reasonable to deduce that it might be responsible for my eye problems.

A. St. John's wort can sensitize the skin and cause nerve damage upon exposure to sunlight. Many drugs that cause such photosensitivity can also make eyes more vulnerable to ultraviolet exposure.

We've never before heard of a situation like yours. To report this event, contact MedWatch at the FDA: call (800) 332-1088; write MedWatch, FDA, 5600 Fishers Lane (HF-2), Rm. 1765, Rockville, MD 20852-9787; or visit the Web site: http://www.fda.gov/medwatch.

Featured Home Remedy

Magnesium Overcomes Insomnia
I have suffered from episodes of insomnia for years and have tried many remedies without relief. Cutting down on caffeine and taking valerian didn't work. Over-the-counter sleep aids such as Benadryl and Tylenol P.M. made me groggy the next day. Even prescription drugs like Ambien didn't help.

Then a friend suggested I try taking magnesium at bedtime. Since I was already taking a calcium-magnesium supplement daily, I started taking the calcium in the daytime and the magnesium (250 mg) at night. Magnesium has helped my insomnia more than anything else I've ever tried. There are still occasional nights when I don't sleep well, but they are few and far between.

I have heard that magnesium supplements can cause diarrhea, but I haven't had that problem. I hope this information will help someone else.

You can read more home remedies on our website:
http://www.peoplespharmacy.org/archives/home_remedies/index.asp

Health Headlines:

Diabetes Drug Still Controversial
The storm of controversy surrounding the diabetes drug Avandia continues to swirl. A few weeks ago research was published in the New England Journal of Medicine linking Avandia to an increased risk of cardiovascular complications. This led scientists to publish an unscheduled interim analysis of another study specifically designed to look at relationships between Avandia and heart issues. It was hoped that this long-term investigation called RECORD would demonstrate that Avandia would lead to an improvement in cardiovascular outcomes.
The manufacturer says that the early Avandia results are reassuring because there was no increased risk of heart attacks when their drug was compared to other diabetes medications. On the other hand, there was no cardiovascular benefit either, which was the whole point of the exercise. The authors of the latest study reported that the interim results were inconclusive, though they noted that Avandia more than doubled the risk of congestive heart failure.
No one should stop Avandia without discussing this complicated issue with a physician. New editorials in the New England Journal of Medicine suggest that caution might be prudent until this Avandia controversy gets sorted out.
[New England Journal of Medicine, online June 5, 2007]
http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/NEJMoa073394

Shun Toothpaste With Antifreeze
Chinese bureaucrats are highly critical of the FDA's warning about Chinese toothpaste. The discovery that DEG or diethylene glycol was found in some imported Chinese toothpaste led the FDA to issue its alert.
DEG is an ingredient in antifreeze and is banned from pharmaceutical products. It has a long and tragic history both in the United States and in other countries. Back in the 1930s an antibiotic elixir was made with diethylene glycol. Many people died. As a result, the U.S. Pure Food and Drug Act was changed so that pharmaceutical manufacturers had to prove safety BEFORE they could market a new medicine.
The Chinese maintain that they have not received any reports of death associated with tainted toothpaste and that the U.S. handling of the matter has been neither scientific nor responsible. On the other hand, DEG is not permitted in any imported drugs, so it would seem that this was a violation of U.S. laws. Until the dust settles, consumers may want to stick to standard brands rather than cheaper, Chinese-made toothpaste.

Coffee Wards Off Liver Cancer
There is continued good news about health benefits from coffee. Prior studies have suggested that coffee drinkers may be at lower risk for type-2 diabetes and gout attacks. Now a meta-analysis from Sweden shows that coffee drinkers seem less likely to develop liver cancer. The scientists noted that two cups a day reduced the risk for this serious malignancy by about 40 percent. They speculate that the antioxidants in coffee may be responsible for this beneficial effect.
[Gastroenterology, May, 2007]
http://www.gastrojournal.org/article/PIIS0016508507005689/abstract

New Drug For Liver Cancer
Speaking of liver cancer, there is exciting news about a drug for this hard-to-treat malignancy. Nexavar is the first medication that has been demonstrated to extend life. Patients with liver cancer lived a median of 10.7 months compared to 7.9 months on placebo. That might not seem like much improvement, but for such a life-threatening tumor, a 44 percent improvement in longevity is seen as an important advance. There were some other advantages associated with Nexavar. For one thing, it can be taken as a pill instead of injected over a period of hours the way chemo is normally administered. The drug was well tolerated compared to standard chemotherapy. Nexavar has already been approved by the FDA for kidney cancer. It is also being studied for the treatment of melanoma, breast and lung cancer. It works in part by blocking tumor proliferation and by interfering with blood vessel formation that supplies nutrients to rapidly dividing cancer cells.
[43rd Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology]

Don't Count On Shark Cartilage
On a less optimistic note, shark cartilage does not appear to be beneficial for patients with lung cancer. For years, promoters of shark cartilage used to advertise that sharks didn't get cancer. The implication was that if humans swallowed shark cartilage they would gain some protective power against cancer. Lab studies have shown that shark cartilage can block cancer cell proliferation and reduce blood supply to tumors. But a clinical trial conducted at the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston did not demonstrate any benefit of shark cartilage for the treatment of lung cancer. The average survival time for patients taking shark cartilage was 14.4 months, while the average time for survival of the patients in the placebo group was 15.6 months. The lead investigator concluded that "current clinical data do not support the use of shark-cartilage products as anticancer therapies."
[43rd Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology]