These tools will no longer be maintained as of December 31, 2024. Archived website can be found here. PubMed4Hh GitHub repository can be found here. Contact NLM Customer Service if you have questions.


Pubmed for Handhelds

PUBMED FOR HANDHELDS

Search MEDLINE/PubMed

  • Title: Novel agents for the control of secretory diarrhoea.
    Author: Farthing MJ.
    Journal: Expert Opin Investig Drugs; 2004 Jul; 13(7):777-85. PubMed ID: 15212618.
    Abstract:
    Acute infectious diarrhoea continues to cause high morbidity and mortality worldwide. Although oral rehydration therapy has reduced the mortality associated with acute diarrhoea, stool volume often increases during the rehydration process. Therefore, for > 20 years there has been a search for agents that will directly inhibit intestinal secretory mechanisms and thereby reduce stool volume. The most obvious target for antisecretory therapy has been the chloride channel and second messengers within the enterocyte. So far, this search has been largely unrewarding, although recent evidence suggests that a new class of chloride channel blocker is effective in vitro but further evaluation in humans is required. In addition, research during the past decade has highlighted the importance of neurohumoral mechanisms in the pathogenesis of diarrhoea, notably the role of 5-hydroxtryptamine, substance P, vasoactive intestinal polypeptide and neural reflexes within the enteric nervous system. This new dimension of intestinal pathophysiology has already exposed possible novel targets for antisecretory therapy; namely, 5-hydroxytryptamine receptor antagonists, substance P antagonists and sigma-receptor agonists. There is also the possibility for potentiating the proabsorptive effects of endogenous enkephalins by using enkephalinase inhibitors. There now seems to be a real possibility that antisecretory therapy will become more widely available in the future.
    [Abstract] [Full Text] [Related] [New Search]