Cryptococcal meningitis is an infection of the lining of the brain and spinal cord. The fungus that causes this infection is found in soil. The risk is highest when CD4 cell counts are below 100. You can get it by breathing in dust. Symptoms include headache, nausea, fever, fatigue, irritability, sensitivity to light, stiff neck, change in mental state, and hallucinations.
The fungus Cryptococcus causes meningitis, a brain disease that kills about 1 million people each year — mainly those with impaired immune systems due to AIDS, cancer treatment or an organ transplant.
A new approach to care for patients with advanced HIV in Tanzania and Zambia, combining community support and screening for a type of meningitis, has reduced deaths by 28%.
A leading microbiologist has warned of the increasing threat that killer fungi poses to humans and the environment.
In a remarkable series of experiments on a fungus that causes cryptococcal meningitis, a deadly infection of the membranes that cover the spinal cord and brain, investigators at UC Davis have isolated a protein that appears to be responsible for the fungus' ability to cross from the bloodstream into the brain.
Tamoxifen, a drug currently used to treat breast cancer, also kills a fungus that causes a deadly brain infection in immunocompromised patients. The findings, which could lead to new treatments for a disease that kills more HIV/AIDS patients than tuberculosis, appear in mBio-, the online open-access journal of the American Society for Microbiology (ASM.)
Viamet Pharmaceuticals, Inc. announced today the initiation of the phase 2 clinical program for its antifungal agent VT-1161. The initial phase 2 study is designed to evaluate the safety and efficacy of VT-1161 in the treatment of vulvovaginal candidiasis (VVC) and is being conducted at leading clinical centers in the United States.
The treatment of cryptococcal meningitis in resource-limited settings is most effective with a short 1-week course of amphotericin induction therapy coupled with high-dose fluconazole for at least 2 weeks, a Ugandan study suggests.
A new rapid test to diagnose melioidosis, a difficult infection to treat - and classified as a biothreat by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention - is being optimized and tested by University of Nevada School of Medicine researcher David AuCoin.
New research conducted by biologists at Texas A&M University suggests that ZOLOFT, one of the most widely prescribed antidepressants in the world, also packs a potential preventative bonus - potent mechanisms capable of inhibiting deadly fungal infections.
Viamet Pharmaceuticals, Inc., announced today that dosing has begun in a Phase 1/2 clinical trial of VT-464, an oral, potent and lyase-selective CYP17 inhibitor for the treatment of castration-refractory prostate cancer.
Researchers will begin drug development projects for rare and neglected diseases that include potential treatments for a musculoskeletal disorder, a cognitive dysfunction disorder, a virus that affects the central nervous system of newborns, a parasitic worm infection, a form of muscular dystrophy and a rare lung disease.
Viamet Pharmaceuticals, Inc., announced today that dosing has begun in a Phase 1 clinical study of VT-1161, an oral, potent and selective antifungal agent. VT-1161 is a novel small molecule discovered by Viamet Pharmaceuticals using its proprietary Metallophile Technology.
The Food and Drug Administration has cleared a new diagnostic test that will help save the lives of hundreds of thousands of AIDS patients stricken with cryptococcosis, a fungal meningitis.
Viamet Pharmaceuticals, Inc. announced today that one of its novel antifungal compounds has been selected for inclusion in the National Institutes of Health's (NIH) Therapeutics for Rare and Neglected Diseases (TRND) program.
New research has shed light on the origins of a fungal infection which is one of the major causes of death from AIDS-related illnesses. The study, published today in the journal PLoS Pathogens, funded by the Wellcome Trust and the BBSRC, shows how the more virulent forms of Cryptococcus neoformans evolved and spread out of Africa and into Asia.
A new, rapid blood test that could lead to early diagnosis and potentially save the lives of hundreds of thousands of people stricken with fungal meningitis, a leading cause of AIDS-related deaths in developing countries, is getting closer to market with a recent collaboration between the University of Nevada, Reno and Immuno-Mycologics in Oklahoma.
A study in this week's PLoS Medicine suggests that AIDS patients with cryptococcal meningitis who start HIV therapy are predisposed to immune reconstitution inflammatory syndrome - an exaggerated inflammatory immune response that kills up to one-third of affected people - if they have biomarkers in their blood showing evidence of a damaged immune system that is not capable of clearing the fungal infection.
Sagent Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a privately held specialty pharmaceutical company, today announced that it has launched fluconazole injection in premix bags. IMS Health estimates that 2008 U.S. sales of fluconazole injection approximated $18 million. Sagent will begin marketing and shipping fluconazole bags immediately.
HIV-positive patients who don't seek medical attention until they have a serious AIDS-related condition can reduce their risk of death or other complications by half if they get antiretroviral treatment early on, according to a new multicenter trial led by researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine.
A clinical study, led by researchers from University College Dublin, Ireland, and Stanford University, California, USA, with international collaborators, demonstrates that mortality rates of HIV patients can be almost halved when early antiretroviral (ARV) therapy is added to the treatment of AIDS-related opportunistic infections (OIs) such as pneumonia, meningitis or other serious bacterial infections.
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