With the deployment of hundreds of thousands of troops in Saudi Arabia, health problems endemic to the Arabian Peninsula may be coming to the attention of physicians in the USA and other areas.

Aspirin is now widely used for antithrombotic prophylaxis in patients who have had angina pectoris or a myocardial infarction and has also been tried in healthy people to prevent myocardial infarction. Recent studies have focused on increasingly lower doses of the drug. The use of aspirin in patients who have had transient ischemic attacks or strokes will not be discussed here.

The number of cough remedies available in the USA continues to multiply, but most products contain the same or similar ingredients in varying combinations. Most acute coughs do not require treatment with drugs, especially in children, and suppression of a productive cough may be harmful.

Recently published guidelines from the American Diabetes Association (ADA) and the Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO) Diabetes Work Group recommend addition of the oral nonsteroidal mineralocorticoid receptor antagonist (MRA) finerenone (Kerendia) to standard treatment in patients with type 2 diabetes and chronic kidney disease (CKD).

The FDA has licensed Capvaxive (PCV21; Merck), a 21-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine, for prevention of invasive pneumococcal disease (IPD) and pneumococcal pneumonia in adults. Four other pneumococcal vaccines are currently available in the US: Prevnar 20 (PCV20), Vaxneuvance (PCV15), and Prevnar 13 (PCV13) are conjugate vaccines licensed for use in persons ≥6 weeks old, and Pneumovax 23 (PPSV23) is a pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccine licensed for use in persons ≥2 years old (see Table 1).

The FDA has announced that the single 32-mg IV dose of ondansetron (Zofran, and generics) used for prevention of cancer chemotherapy-associated nausea and vomiting has been withdrawn from the market because it can prolong the QT interval and could possibly cause a torsades de pointes cardiac arrhythmia. For this indication, the only recommended dose of IV ondansetron is 0.15 mg/kg (maximum 16 mg/dose) every 4 hours for 3 doses. There are no changes in the recommended dosing regimens for oral ondansetron or for IV ondansetron used for prevention of postoperative nausea and vomiting.Download...

(Kodak) perform clinical chemistry tests using desk-top instruments, microliter samples and postage-stamp-sized analytical slides containing dry reagents layered on clear polyester and mounted in plastic. The system requires no wet reagents, except for electrolyte determinations, and is designed to require a minimum amount of training to operate. A single analysis takes about five minutes.

Seasonale (Barr), the first "extended-cycle" oral contraceptive, is now available in the US for pregnancy prevention. Active tablets containing 30 ╡g of ethinyl estradiol and 0.15 mg of levonorgestrel are taken for 84 consecutive days, followed by 7 days of inactive tablets, allowing for withdrawal bleeding only four times a year. Other combination oral contraceptives are dispensed as 21 days of active tablets and 7 days of placebo or no tablets, resulting in 13 withdrawal bleeding episodes each year.

The FDA has licensed a 13-valent conjugate pneumococcal vaccine (PCV13; Prevnar 13 – Pfizer) for the prevention of invasive pneumococcal disease (IPD) in infants and children <6 years old. It replaces Prevnar (PCV7). An unconjugated 23-valent polysaccharide vaccine (PPSV23; Pneumovax 23 – Merck) is FDA-approved for use in adults.

Olaratumab (Lartruvo – Lilly), a platelet-derived growth factor receptor alpha (PDGFR-α) blocking monoclonal antibody, has received accelerated approval from the FDA for use in combination with the anthracycline doxorubicin for first-line treatment of adults with soft-tissue sarcoma histologic subtypes considered susceptible to anthracyclines. Approval is limited to locally advanced or metastatic soft-tissue sarcomas that are not amenable to curative radiotherapy or surgery, and is contingent on verification of clinical benefit in a confirmatory phase 3 trial.