Robert Krabill can't go far before the symptoms of his disease start to show.
"It's when I get up and start walking around or going someplace or doing something, then the breathing takes its toll," Krabill said.
Krabill has idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, or IPF. It's a disease that causes scar tissue to form on his lungs.
"Patients might experience shortness of breath, coughing, fatigue, inability to do the things they usually want to do," explained Dr. Daniel Culver, pulmonologist and staff physician, Cleveland Clinic.
Those with IPF are typically given three to five years to live. Until now, there were no treatments to slow it down.
"If you compare IPF to many cancers, the prognosis for IPF is far worse," Culver said.
But two new FDA-approved drugs are offering patients hope for the first time. In clinical trials, nintedanib and pirfenidone slowed down lung scarring and reduced breathing difficulties by about half. They are the first medicines approved to treat the disease.
"Having two medications where we had zero for so many years and where we gave people a death sentence for so many years when we made the diagnosis is a huge step forward," Culver said.
Krabill will start on the medication in the next couple weeks. He hopes it will give him a little more time.
"See what happens and maybe be here a little longer," Krabill said.
The two drugs were approved by the FDA in October 2014.
IPF is the leading cause of lung transplants in the U.S. Experts aren't exactly sure what causes it, but people who have experienced inhalation exposures to smoking or dust are more at risk.
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