Have questions about Ivermectin? Experts have answers
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Ivermectin isn’t the first medicine that has garnered the hopes of curious or vaccine-hesitant people as a potential treatment for COVID-19, but it’s the one drawing potential patients to farm supply and pet stores across the country.Some stores like Tractor Supply Company and feed mills are running low on stock of veterinary medicines like Ivermectin paste for horses or bottles of sheep drench, as the infected or cautious try to find a cheap and easy way to fight the virus.While some area doctors are prescribing the human form of the medicine that experts overwhelmingly agree could just be a placebo, regional poison control centers are seeing an uptick in emergencies from people trying out barnyard cures. Medical experts fielding questions about the medicine aren’t surprised that patients willing to take their health into their own hands aren’t keen on answering questions about it.Dr. Msonthi Levine, a primary care physician with a private practice in Beaumont, Texas, said that the latest obsession with Ivermectin is just a symptom of the American medical system that he says doctors face every day.”There is a long history of people being overwhelmed with so much information and being paralyzed about what to do,” Levine said. “If it sounds good to us and matches what we are inclined to believe, we will try it. Even if it goes against research.”Patients continue to request prescriptions from Levine multiple times a week, and he said he even wrote for it a few times when it was first being suggested as a possible treatment, but now he believes it is clear from peer-reviewed research that there is no legit connection to its ability to fight the virus.But, he said it is as easy to convince a patient that the miracle cure they read about on the internet isn’t the right answer as it is to suggest they change their diet or take a specific medicine they read bad reviews about online.Ivermectin follows in the footsteps of medicines like hydroxychloroquine that have become popular alternative medicines, but are only a few of the different medicines that researchers or doctors have tested to see if it could impact COVID-19 infections.Levine said the difference is they are just a few of the substances that have been promoted by popular figures in the media, which usually immediately launches a wave of requests from patients.Getting a patient to trust expert advice, even from a doctor they may know and frequently rely on, can be even harder when they know a clinic down the street may easily give them what they want.Levine said he has a moral obligation not to prescribe something that medical research has clearly demonstrated wouldn’t be beneficial to his patients.”I basically try to remind them that, in my opinion, the peer-reviewed sources I go to tell me it hasn’t been studied enough and it hasn’t been recommended to treat this illness,” Levine said. “If it won’t help and could potentially harm, then I have taken an oath not to do anything that could be potentially harmful.”For every doctor that has decided not to risk giving false hope, there seems to be increasingly larger online networks of people sharing resources for finding doctors or services that will connect them to Ivermectin. Others are simply opting for animal varieties easily obtained over the counter or online.Unfortunately, these at-home treatments have translated to a rash of poisoning cases, as people accidentally overdose on the medicine made for livestock weighing thousands of pounds.Mark Winter, the director of the Southeast Texas Poison Center and a pharmacology professor at the University of Texas Medical Branch’s School of Medicine, said that the call volume of cases related to Ivermectin has recently grown by 115%, and daily call volumes are well exceeding the average.Some of these calls have been from parents whose children have downed easily-opened tubes of fruit-flavored paste meant for horses, but most are from adults treating themselves.”The difficult part is differentiating their symptoms from that of COVID-19, if they are infected,” Winter said. “We can’t do that over the phone, and many hospitals are too overwhelmed to easily accept them. It’s a difficult situation.”But the fact that veterinary Ivermectin might be causing poisonings isn’t surprising to experts. Especially when considering the forms they come in and advice people are being given online.Usually, one dose of Ivermectin formulated for humans is given to treat severe parasitic infections like the so-called “river blindness,” named for the mass of worms that can breed in people’s eyes after drinking infected water.Winter said a six-gram tube of horse paste can contain up to 30 equivalent doses and can be difficult to accurately divide.To make matters worse, he found while researching information to present to Texas doctors that many websites are telling people to take between one dose for two days or two doses for five days. Some promise to even reverse lasting effects of COVID-19 infections by taking large doses of the medicine.When poisoned callers phone the line, the first sign is usually abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting or diarrhea. More severe symptoms can include chest pain, which is a sign of neurological issues, and liver problems.Advice from poison centers can be life-saving for people that have overdosed, but Winter said experts are just as susceptible to the kind of doubt and mistrust that physicians face.”Usually the first thing we hear on a call is ‘my child just ate this substance and I read on the internet that they are going to die,'” he said. “When we tell them that their child will be fine if they follow these steps, they almost always ask if we are sure.”While doctors may legally prescribe Ivermectin to patients for purposes other than treating parasites, some could be facing repercussions under certain circumstances. One doctor recently gained notoriety after it was reported he was prescribing the medicine to inmates at an Arkansas jail.The state’s medical board confirmed Friday that it had opened an investigation into the doctor’s actions.Some physicians, like the one in Arkansas, had justified the practice of using human forms of the parasite treatment by pointing to limited trial data from the National Institutes of Health. The agency concluded there were signs that Ivermectin could eliminate cultures of COVID-19 in test tubes.Winter said that on its face, that development may make Ivermectin seem like a perfectly acceptable treatment, but the same result has been found with household cleaners like bleach.”The best prevention at this point is preventing infection, which means vaccinations and wearing a mask,” Winter said.
Ivermectin isn’t the first medicine that has garnered the hopes of curious or vaccine-hesitant people as a potential treatment for COVID-19, but it’s the one drawing potential patients to farm supply and pet stores across the country.
Some stores like Tractor Supply Company and feed mills are running low on stock of veterinary medicines like Ivermectin paste for horses or bottles of sheep drench, as the infected or cautious try to find a cheap and easy way to fight the virus.
While some area doctors are prescribing the human form of the medicine that experts overwhelmingly agree could just be a placebo, regional poison control centers are seeing an uptick in emergencies from people trying out barnyard cures.
Medical experts fielding questions about the medicine aren’t surprised that patients willing to take their health into their own hands aren’t keen on answering questions about it.
Dr. Msonthi Levine, a primary care physician with a private practice in Beaumont, Texas, said that the latest obsession with Ivermectin is just a symptom of the American medical system that he says doctors face every day.
“There is a long history of people being overwhelmed with so much information and being paralyzed about what to do,” Levine said. “If it sounds good to us and matches what we are inclined to believe, we will try it. Even if it goes against research.”
Patients continue to request prescriptions from Levine multiple times a week, and he said he even wrote for it a few times when it was first being suggested as a possible treatment, but now he believes it is clear from peer-reviewed research that there is no legit connection to its ability to fight the virus.
But, he said it is as easy to convince a patient that the miracle cure they read about on the internet isn’t the right answer as it is to suggest they change their diet or take a specific medicine they read bad reviews about online.
Ivermectin follows in the footsteps of medicines like hydroxychloroquine that have become popular alternative medicines, but are only a few of the different medicines that researchers or doctors have tested to see if it could impact COVID-19 infections.
Levine said the difference is they are just a few of the substances that have been promoted by popular figures in the media, which usually immediately launches a wave of requests from patients.
Getting a patient to trust expert advice, even from a doctor they may know and frequently rely on, can be even harder when they know a clinic down the street may easily give them what they want.
Levine said he has a moral obligation not to prescribe something that medical research has clearly demonstrated wouldn’t be beneficial to his patients.
“I basically try to remind them that, in my opinion, the peer-reviewed sources I go to tell me it hasn’t been studied enough and it hasn’t been recommended to treat this illness,” Levine said. “If it won’t help and could potentially harm, then I have taken an oath not to do anything that could be potentially harmful.”
For every doctor that has decided not to risk giving false hope, there seems to be increasingly larger online networks of people sharing resources for finding doctors or services that will connect them to Ivermectin. Others are simply opting for animal varieties easily obtained over the counter or online.
Unfortunately, these at-home treatments have translated to a rash of poisoning cases, as people accidentally overdose on the medicine made for livestock weighing thousands of pounds.
Mark Winter, the director of the Southeast Texas Poison Center and a pharmacology professor at the University of Texas Medical Branch’s School of Medicine, said that the call volume of cases related to Ivermectin has recently grown by 115%, and daily call volumes are well exceeding the average.
Some of these calls have been from parents whose children have downed easily-opened tubes of fruit-flavored paste meant for horses, but most are from adults treating themselves.
“The difficult part is differentiating their symptoms from that of COVID-19, if they are infected,” Winter said. “We can’t do that over the phone, and many hospitals are too overwhelmed to easily accept them. It’s a difficult situation.”
But the fact that veterinary Ivermectin might be causing poisonings isn’t surprising to experts. Especially when considering the forms they come in and advice people are being given online.
Usually, one dose of Ivermectin formulated for humans is given to treat severe parasitic infections like the so-called “river blindness,” named for the mass of worms that can breed in people’s eyes after drinking infected water.
Winter said a six-gram tube of horse paste can contain up to 30 equivalent doses and can be difficult to accurately divide.
To make matters worse, he found while researching information to present to Texas doctors that many websites are telling people to take between one dose for two days or two doses for five days. Some promise to even reverse lasting effects of COVID-19 infections by taking large doses of the medicine.
When poisoned callers phone the line, the first sign is usually abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting or diarrhea. More severe symptoms can include chest pain, which is a sign of neurological issues, and liver problems.
Advice from poison centers can be life-saving for people that have overdosed, but Winter said experts are just as susceptible to the kind of doubt and mistrust that physicians face.
“Usually the first thing we hear on a call is ‘my child just ate this substance and I read on the internet that they are going to die,'” he said. “When we tell them that their child will be fine if they follow these steps, they almost always ask if we are sure.”
While doctors may legally prescribe Ivermectin to patients for purposes other than treating parasites, some could be facing repercussions under certain circumstances. One doctor recently gained notoriety after it was reported he was prescribing the medicine to inmates at an Arkansas jail.
The state’s medical board confirmed Friday that it had opened an investigation into the doctor’s actions.
Some physicians, like the one in Arkansas, had justified the practice of using human forms of the parasite treatment by pointing to limited trial data from the National Institutes of Health. The agency concluded there were signs that Ivermectin could eliminate cultures of COVID-19 in test tubes.
Winter said that on its face, that development may make Ivermectin seem like a perfectly acceptable treatment, but the same result has been found with household cleaners like bleach.
“The best prevention at this point is preventing infection, which means vaccinations and wearing a mask,” Winter said.
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