Saturday 3 January 2015

Taking care of teeth and gum

Brush two times in a day to keep gum and teeth clean. If teeth is not cleaned properly after eating food, bacteria grow and acid is released that decays teeth. Improperly cleaned teeth support development of tartar that facilitate loosening of gum. This in long run can loosen your teeth and teeth will fall early. Very hard brush can damage enamel while very soft brush can not remove dart from teeth. For many people, brushing can not remove food particles between teeth. In such case dental flush should be used to keep teeth and gum healthy.  Many times unhealthy and inflamed gum is responsible for bad breath.  

Weak teeth is sensitive to cold and hot drinks. Special medicated tooth paste are available to treat such condition, but teeth must be kept clean to get benefit of such medicated products.

Chewing gum can be helpful to keep mouth moist, but persons having deep bite problem must avoid regular use of chewing gum. 

Demerit of mercury filling...


Important website(s).
1. http://www.ada.org/en/science-research/ada-seal-of-acceptance/product-category-information/toothpaste

How animals are useful in drug development?

Before any drug is tested on humans it has to be tested on animals.

As a preliminary study, companies test the effect of new chemicals on animals. After the new chemical passes safety and efficacy standards then companies obtain permission from food and drug administration (FDA) for testing the effect of chemical on interested human subjects.   

FDA (and/ other relevant authorities) scrutinize the data of animal study to analyse the beneficial effect of new chemical on animals. After FDA is satisfied with the data then it permit to test chemicals on humans as per set standards and protocols. 

Suppose a company wants to market a new medicine to treat diabetes. It select a suitable animal model of mice/rat, and induce diabetes by administering streptozotocin and then administer new chemical to test if it decreases blood sugar. Some time isolated animal tissues are also helpful to test the effect of new chemical. When FDA is satisfied with the fact that new chemical decrease blood sugar level and safe to animal, FDA permits to test the effect of new chemicals on healthy and diabetes patients. If the new chemical meets safety and efficacy standard then company gets FDA nod to market it and now the new chemical becomes a medicine.

For science research, animal study protocol need to be approved by ethics committee. Animals are treated humanly and are maintained under standard laboratory conditions (room temperature, suitable humidity,  environment with minimal noise, sufficient food and water). 

References:
1. Mark Mathieu. New Drug Development: A regulatory overview. Parexel Intl Corp. 
2. Goswami SK, Manikanta V, Suma KG, Razdan R, Inmadar MN. Efficacy of Ellagic acid and sildenafil in Diabetes induced sexual dysfunction. Pharmacog Mag 2014; 10(Suppl S3): 581-7. 
3. Goswami SK, Inamdar MN. Screening of new compounds for the management of erectile dysfunction. J Young Pharm 2014; 6(4):51-55.