geoffrey modest medical blogs

  A recent Belgian study found that the use of proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) is associated with increased exacerbations of COPD and asthma (which they refer to as chronic obstructive airway diseases, COADs) in a dose-response way: see copd inc with PPIs Chest2026 in dropbox, or DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chest.2026.01.002   Details : -- 932,135 patients (with a total of 1,084,446 person-years of follow-up) were identified using the Belgian nationwide claims-based data of adult patients receiving long-term medication for COADs (ie, having at least two dispensings of medication for obstructive lung diseases) between 2017 and 2022 -- patients on histamine type 2 receptor antagonists (H2RAs) were excluded (at that time there was a carcinogen impurity found in ranitidine, the most prescribed H2 blocker, that was taken off the market), -- 416,087 patients (44.6%) were also receiving PPIs: -- mean age 61, 54% female, 29% low socioeconomic status (assessed by their medical cover...

  In people with hearing loss and high risk of developing dementia, hearing aids reduced cognitive decline in the ACHIEVE study ( see  dementia hearing loss Lancet2023  in dropbox, or  doi.org/10.1016/ S0140-6736(23)01406-X)    Details :  -- 1716 participants were recruited from the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) study, which included a random sample of four community-based sites in the US (Forsyth County North Carolina, Jackson Mississippi, Minneapolis suburbs, and Washington County Maryland). there was also a de novo set of healthy community volunteers recruited in order to match the advancing age of the initial ARIC participants; these de novo participants were 70-84 years old and had untreated hearing loss but without substantial cognitive impairment, from 2017-2019     -- the ARIC study is an ongoing longitudinal study of adults who were aged 45-64 at study onset, to help understand the risk factors for heart disease and...