Friday, August 22, 2008

Obese Rats Successfully Treated With Addiction Drug

Medical News Today (Aug. 22, 2008 9:00 PDT) - US scientists testing the epilepsy drug vigabatrin (GVG) as a potential treatment for drug addiction, discovered that it also led to rapid weight loss and reduced food intake in genetically bred obese rats.

The discovery by scientists at the US Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory, is published in the 20 August advance online issue of the journal Synapse.

Vigabatrin is currently being tested throughout the US in Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Phase II trials for the treatment of cocaine and methamphetamine addiction.

For this latest study, the scientists at the DOE's Brookhaven Laboratory found that rats that were genetically bred to be obese showed a 19 per cent loss of total body weight while rats that were not obese lost 12 to 20 per cent, after less than two months on vigabatrin.

Click here to read entire article at Medical News Today

No comments: