Protease Inhibitors. Essay, Research Paper

Protease inhibitors. For more than a decade, researches and physicians tried to develop new treatment to fight HIV. They came up with some drugs; however, these drugs have proved to be usefulness. They did not cured HIV, but slowed it down. Today, a new class of drugs is providing a New Hope against fighting HIV: protease inhibitors. Protease inhibitors are antiviral drugs. They interrupt the way HIV uses a healthy cell to make more viruses. When HIV enters a normal healthy cell, it’s concerned with producing more viruses in order to infect other healthy cells. The virus uses two proteins: reverse transcriptase and protease. The goal of the protease inhibitor is to stop the protease from creating a copy of the virus. Protease inhibitors are chemically similar to the long viral chain that the HIV protease enzymes normally cut. HIV protease enzymes mistake the inhibitor for viral protein. From it follows that he longer HIV proteins remain uncut or miscut, and it causes them to produce defective and therefore non-infectious new copies of HIV. Immediately, protease inhibitors can greatly reduce the number of new, infectious copies of HIV inside the call and cuts the spread of HIV infection in the body. Protease inhibitors are the most powerful anti-HIV drugs. Currently, there are four approved protease inhibitors: Ritonavir (Novir), Saquinavir (Invirase), Nelfinavir (Viracept), and Indinavir (Crixivan). Research shows that when those drugs combined with one or more other drugs combined with one or more other drugs combined with one or more other drugs combines with one or more other drugs (such as AZT, ddI, d4T and other), it works more effective. Some people, who have been taking protease Inhibitors, had the following benefits: 1) Increase in CD4 (T-cell) counts that can help fight infection; 2) Decrease in the amount of virus on the blood. Which may slow down the disease process; and/or 3) Feeling of improved overall health and ability to do more of their usual activities. Even though protease inhibitors have promising results in studies, there are various weak sides in them. First of all, researchers do not yet know how well they will work in different people. The long-term efficiency may be limited, particularly for the people who begin treatment in the late phase of the HIV progress, and for those who have been on different drugs in the past. In addition to this, protease inhibitors cause variety of side effects. Diabetes is one of the side effects. 35% of people developed diabetes. Also, dentists have found a strong increase on raped tooth decay in protease clients. Protease inhibitors, such as Indinavir, causes crystallization in some people’s urine and urinary tracks. Furthermore, protease inhibitors share some side effects causes by any strong medication. Those are stomach discomfort, nausea or gagging, bad taste in the mouth, rashes, and more.

There is a new compound known as integrase inhibitor shows promise in treating HIV, but all of the agents tasted so far have been extremely toxic. Integrase inhibitors should inactivate the enzyme that allows HIV to penetrate the cell nucleus, thereby controlling the progress of the virus. If integrase inhibitors can be perfected, it may be possible to treat patients effectively with lower doses of medicine, by combining integrase, protease and NRT inhibitors. Now, integrase inhibitors are so toxic, that they can destroy a cell at the first contact. I used the following web sites:1) http://www.concentric.net/ thoco/experime.htm Created by Medco Health Care Services, INC.2) http://www.terastar.com/glcc/library/protease.html Created by Gay and Lesbian Community Center.3) http://w3.icdc.com/ niteowl/protease2.htm Created by DCAN (Delaware County AIDS Network).4) http://thebody.com/aac/jun2596.html Created by AIDS Network Alert.The web site created by Medco Health Care Services Inc. is somewhat helpful. Its purpose is to explore new medical experiments.The web site created by DCAN was very helpful. It has a lot of concrete information, which fixed in a very understandable tone. The Gay and Lesbian Community Center’s site has many different sites of interests. Its main purpose is to unite the gay community and to discuss some problems they might have. Its HIV treatment information was helpful.The Aids Action Network Alert site was very helpful. Its purpose is to provide latest information about AIDS and its treatment.