Options in screening for colon cancer include fecal occult blood tests, flexible sigmoidoscopy, colonoscopy, computed tomography (CT) colonography and fecal DNA tests. Since the last Medical Letter article on this subject, more data have become available on colonography.

The FDA has approved artemether-lumefantrine (Coartem - Novartis) for oral treatment of uncomplicated Plasmodium falciparum malaria. It is not approved for prophylaxis. Artemether-lumefantrine is the first artemisinin-based drug approved for use in the US. Artemisinins are Chinese herbal products used worldwide to treat malaria. The intravenous formulation of artesunate, another artemisinin, is available in the US through the CDC.

Development of abuse-deterrent opioid products, including reformulation of existing products, has become a priority for drug manufacturers and public health advocates. Three available opioid formulations, OxyContin (Purdue), Embeda (Pfizer), and Hysingla ER (Purdue), now include claims of abuse deterrence in their package inserts.

The FDA has approved racemic amphetamine sulfate (Evekeo – Arbor) for oral treatment of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children ≥3 years old. It was also approved for treatment of narcolepsy in patients ≥6 years old and for short-term treatment of obesity in patients ≥12 years old.

The FDA has approved patiromer (Veltassa – Relypsa), an oral potassium binder, for treatment of hyperkalemia. It is the first drug to be approved for this indication since the cation-exchange resin sodium polystyrene sulfonate (Kayexalate, and others) in 1958. Patiromer is not indicated for emergency correction of life-threatening hyperkalemia. Sodium zirconium cyclosilicate, another oral potassium binder, is currently being reviewed by the FDA; a decision on its approval is expected in May 2016.

The FDA has approved secnidazole oral granules (Solosec – Symbiomix/Lupin) for single-dose treatment of bacterial vaginosis (BV) in adult women.

The FDA has issued an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for Regeneron's investigational monoclonal antibodies casirivimab and imdevimab (REGEN-COV) to be administered together by IV infusion or SC injection for treatment of mild to moderate COVID-19 in adults and pediatric patients (≥12 years old and weigh ≥40 kg) who are at high risk of progressing to severe COVID-19 and/or hospitalization.

Finerenone (Kerendia – Bayer), an oral nonsteroidal mineralocorticoid receptor antagonist (MRA), has been approved by the FDA to reduce the risk of sustained eGFR decline, end-stage renal disease, nonfatal MI, hospitalization for heart failure (HF), and cardiovascular death in adults with chronic kidney disease (CKD) associated with type 2 diabetes. It is the first nonsteroidal MRA to be approved in the US.

The FDA has approved dasiglucagon (Zegalogue – Zealand) for subcutaneous (SC) treatment of severe hypoglycemia in patients ≥6 years old with diabetes. Dasiglucagon is the third glucagon product to be marketed in the US that does not require reconstitution before administration; Gvoke, a SC formulation approved for use in patients ≥2 years old, and Baqsimi, an intranasal powder approved for use in patients ≥4 years old, have been available since 2019. Injectable glucagon emergency kits (GlucaGen HypoKit, and generics) have been available for years, but they require...

The IV antiviral drug remdesivir (Veklury – Gilead) has been available for treatment of COVID-19 in hospitalized patients since 2020. Now, the FDA has approved remdesivir for treatment of mild to moderate COVID-19 in outpatients ≥12 years old who weigh ≥40 kg and are at high risk for progression to severe disease, including hospitalization or death; they also issued an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) allowing its use in any other high-risk outpatient who weighs ≥3.5 kg.