Advances in therapy
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Advances in therapy · Oct 2008
Clinical TrialOpen experience with a new myorelaxant agent for low back pain.
Eperisone hydrochloride has been recently proposed as a muscle relaxant for the treatment of muscle contracture and chronic low back pain (LBP) as it is devoid of clinically relevant sedative effects on the central nervous system (CNS). We tested this hypothesis by performing a study of patients with LBP and muscle contracture who were treated with full-dose eperisone. ⋯ Eperisone had an analgesic and muscle relaxant effect in patients with LBP. It should be noted that while it is common practice in rheumatology to combine a pain killer with a muscle relaxant in order to achieve a satisfactory result on both symptoms, the present results with eperisone were achieved with a single drug. With an improved tolerability profile compared with nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, and a lack of significant adverse effects on the CNS, eperisone hydrochloride represents a valuable alternative to traditional analgesics and muscle relaxants for the treatment of LBP.
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Fournier's gangrene was originally described as scrotal gangrene in young males. Today, it is generally accepted as synergistic necrotizing fasciitis of perineal, genital, or perianal regions, and the epidemiologic data have changed. However, there are still limited data about females due to the lack of female patients, even in large case series. ⋯ Fournier's gangrene is still an important disease with high mortality rates in spite of the developments in intensive care units and new-generation antibiotics. It seems that there are no major differences between male and female patients in the characteristics of the condition.