Dr K K Aggarwal

Linagliptin new DPP–IV inhibitor

It is used as an adjunct to diet and exercise in adults with type 2 diabetes mellitus. It can be used as monotherapy or in combination with other oral agents. It lowers A1C by o.5% (1–4). Adverse reactions were uncommon, but include nasopharyngitis, hyperlipidemia, cough, hypertriglyceridemia, and weight gain (5).

As it is eliminated via the enterohepatic system, no dose adjustment is necessary in patients with renal or hepatic impairment.

References

1. Diabetes Obes Metab 2011;13:65.
2. Diabetes Obes Metab 2011;13:258.
3. Scott LJ. Linagliptin: in type 2 diabetes mellitus. Drugs 2011;71:611.
4. Diabetes Obes Metab 2011.
5. http://bidocs.boehringer–ingelheim.com/BIWebAccess/ViewServlet.ser?
   docBase=renetnt&folderPath=/Prescribing+Information/PIs/Tradjenta/Tradjenta.pdf

Metformin reduces A1C levels more than DPP–IV inhibitor monotherapy

Metformin as initial therapy is supported by a meta–analysis of 140 trials and 26 observational studies.

Older drugs (metformin and second generation sulfonylureas) had similar efficacy in reducing A1C values (1%) and other cardiovascular risk factors (blood pressure, lipids, body weight) compared with newer drugs (thiazolidinediones, meglitinides, and GLP–1 receptor agonists).

Ann Intern Med 2011; 154:602.

Was Lord Ganesha born of a stem cell transplant?

Today West claims that they can make human bladder tissue from the human skin cells. But was not lord Ganesha created by Parvati from the dirt of her body? The dirt from allopathic point of view would equate to the cells of her skin. In today’s terms Ganesha birth can be explained as the origin of stem cell baby birth in the literature. .

First identified in the hematopoietic blood system stem cells are present in many other tissues.  All stem cells are capable of self-renewal and they can differentiate.

Self-renewal is the ability to proliferate without the loss of differentiation potential and without undergoing biologic aging. Stem cells can divide symmetrically (in which both daughter cells are either stem cells or differentiated cells) or asymmetrically (yielding both a stem cell and a more differentiated cell)
Stem cells can be either totipotent, pluripotent, multipotent, or unipotent. Totipotent cells can produce all cell types (embryonic and extra embryonic placenta). Pluripotent cells can only make cells of the embryo proper. Multipotent cells can only make cells within a given germ layer. Unipotent cells make cells of a single cell type.
In 2006 Shinya Yamanaka and colleagues introduced genes expressed in pluripotent cells into mature cells by a process, called reprogramming and induced a pluripotent state in a previously differentiated cell type. These cells are now called induced pluripotent cells (iPS).

iPS technology has revolutioned science today. A keratinocyte derived from the skin can be induced to become a pluripotent stem cell. Also a cell taken from an individual can be induced to become a cell type capable of forming any other cell type. A skin obtained from a patient with a degenerative brain disorder is now used as a drug after getting converted into a pluripotent cell.
Today the recognition that a cell taken from an individual can be induced to become pluripotent (a cell type capable of forming any other cell type in that individual’s body) has provided unprecedented opportunities for regenerative medicine.
Today most easily accessible patient cell types, such as skin fibroblasts or blood cells are being reprogrammed to iPS.

Theoretically therefore it is possible to make any tissue from iPS.  That means the skin cells can make liver, brain, heart or I fact the whole baby.

It looks that this technology claimed by the Western scientists of converting skin cell into iPS cell was available in our Vedic era and the birth of Ganesha by Parvati might have been an example of the first human baby made from the skin iPS.