A team of Quebec City researchers have opened the way for a new treatment of pulmonary hypertension, which is a very severe and life-threatening condition that triggers an enlargement of the heart.
Pulmonary hypertension is abnormally high blood pressure within the pulmonary arteries, which carry blood from the heart to the lungs.
People suffering from this condition get tired really fast, are short of breath, have their feet and ankles swollen, and all this because their blood has more difficulties flowing to the lungs.
For them, everyday tasks often seem impossible, so this new study carried out by a
Heart and Stroke Foundation researcher could lead the way to an effective diagnosis and treatment for this condition.
Dr. Sébastien Bonnet, a professor at Laval University and a researcher at Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Québec, explained at the Canadian Cardiovascular Congress 2010, co-hosted by the Heart and Stroke Foundation and the Canadian Cardiovascular Society, that they “have discovered an early warning system in a protein called PIM-1,” which can be used as a marker of pulmonary hypertension.
He explained that “blood samples were taken from patients to measure PIM-1 expression in the blood.
“We were surprised to find that the greater the PIM-1 levels, the more severe the pulmonary hypertension in the patient.”
Pulmonary hypertension is a condition that is often discovered too late so this new discovery is very important, as now doctors know that if there is even a small increase in PIM-1, something is wrong.
Besides giving the possibility of detecting the condition early on, the PIM-1 also gives a treatment to pulmonary hypertension, because if the protein is blocked, the condition is reversed.
Dr. Bonnet says that “this is a remarkable finding.
“We have found that using gene therapy to inhibit the inappropriate activation of this protein is a novel and effective therapy that can reverse the disease altogether.”
This discovery gives a second chance to people suffering from this condition, because before, there was no way of reversing it, and drug treatments could only improve quality of life, but were unable to cure the disease.
Dr. Beth Abramson is the spokesperson for the Heart and Stroke Foundation and she explains that “pulmonary hypertension is a rare but life-threatening condition.
“These are often very sick individuals,[as] by the time a patient gets to a doctor, the disease is usually well established.”
She adds that people at increased risk of developing pulmonary hypertension include those with a family history and those with a history of blood clots in the lungs, or pulmonary embolism.
These people should pay special attention to any symptoms like shortness of breath or extreme tiredness.
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