Medications and treatments Archive

When you're packing a hurricane go-bag, keep health priorities in mind. If you don't prepare in advance, you might leave behind medicines, medical supplies, important paperwork, and other essentials that can help you stay healthy. Here's how to plan ahead.

Many people believe they have allergies to certain medications, even though they really don't. It could be that they experienced only a drug side effect after taking a particular drug, not a true allergic reaction (which is an immune system response). Unfortunately, inaccurate information can limit treatment options. So it's best to confirm a suspected drug allergy with an allergist. That typically involves getting a simple skin test or taking a very small dose of the medication in question in the presence of a medical team.

Cardiac rehabilitation, a personalized program of supervised exercise and heart-healthy lifestyle coaching, helps people recover from heart-related problems, including stable angina, heart attack, heart surgery, and stable heart failure. A 12-week program helps people regain their stamina, enabling them to resume their favorite activities, and may also lessen stress and depression. Cardiac rehab is also proven to lower the risk of future heart-related illness and hospitalization and may help people live longer.

Guidelines advise unvaccinated people at high risk for severe COVID to take Paxlovid (nirmatrelvir with ritonavir) soon after symptoms begin. However, a 2024 study suggests that people who are vaccinated and high-risk or unvaccinated and low-risk don't need to do so.

Using a Web-based app, most people can correctly assess their need for a cholesterol-lowering statin and take the drug appropriately with good results, according to a 2024 study. If approved, the app could facilitate statin use without a doctor's prescription.

The American Heart Association's first-ever scientific statement on artificial intelligence (A.I.) in cardiology explores how the technology may improve how doctors prevent, detect, and treat heart disease. For example, A.I. data from patch monitors may predict who will develop potentially serious heart rhythms. Applying A.I. tools to a single chest x-ray may predict a person's risk of heart attack and other serious health problems.

A 2024 study suggests using cannabis weekly may be associated with an increase in people's risks of heart attack and stroke, and the risks rise dramatically with more frequent use.

Vertigo is a symptom, not a condition. It can make people feel lightheaded, faint, unsteady, or like the room is spinning. Common conditions causing vertigo include benign paroxysmal positional vertigo, vestibular migraines, vestibular neuritis, and Meniare's disease. People should see a doctor after a single vertigo episode to determine the cause. Depending on the cause, treatments might include medications, a canalith repositioning procedure, vestibular therapy, and cognitive behavioral therapy. Staying active, not sedentary, between episodes can help people with vertigo feel better.

Artificial intelligence, or A.I., has been used in women's health care for decades. A.I. helps detect and track breast cancer, endometriosis, fibroids, cervical precancers, and other conditions. A.I.-driven mammography software may reveal more breast cancers than radiologists detect alone. A.I. may soon streamline women's breast cancer risk assessment scores to aid screening. Experts once predicted that A.I. would replace radiologists, but that hasn't happened and isn't likely, according to Harvard specialists.