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(CBS/AP) Medicines generally have side effects, but once in awhile the side effects may treat other conditions. Viagra after all, was originally a blood pressure medicine. Amantadine, an old flu medicine approved in the 1960s, was found a few years later to improve symptoms of Parkinson’s disease. now a new study shows the drug may also speed recovery from severe brain injuries.

The study, published Mar. 1 in the New England Journal of Medicine, involved 184 patients who had severe brain injuries caused by falls and car crashes. about a third were in a vegetative state (unconscious but with periods of wakefulness) and the rest were minimally conscious.

The patients were randomly assigned to receive amantadine or a placebo daily for four weeks. They were treated within one to four months after getting injuried – a period when a lot of patients get better on their own, according to study author Joseph Giacino, a neurologist at Boston’s Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital.

The researchers found both groups made small but significant improvements, but the rate of recovery was faster in the group getting amantadine. changes included the ability to give yes-and-no answers, follow commands or use a spoon or hairbrush. Of the patients who received amantadine, only 17 percent remained in a vegetative state, versus 32 percent of those who received the dummy drug.

When treatment stopped, recovery in the amantadine group slowed and two weeks later, the level of recovery in the two groups was about the same.

The study was short, and the effect on long-term outcome is unknown. But Giacino said the drug still has value even if it only hastens recovery. The study also didn’t include those with penetrating head injuries, like the gunshot wound former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords suffered, but Giacino said the drug should have similar effects in those patients. whether it would work in patients with brain injuries not caused by trauma, such as a stroke, isn’t known.

“This drug moved the needle in terms of speeding patient recovery, and that’s not been shown before,” Giacino said. “It really does provide hope for a population that is viewed in many places as hopeless.”

Many doctors began using amantadine for brain injuries years ago, but until now there’s never been a big study to show that it works.

Doctors first had an inkling that the inexpensive generic amantadine might have other uses a few years after its approval when it appeared to improve Parkinson’s symptoms in nursing home patients. it was found to have an effect on the brain’s dopamine system, whose many functions include movement and alertness, and it was eventually approved for Parkinson’s.

It’s now commonly used for brain injuries, and the researchers felt it was important to find out “whether we’re treating patients with a useful drug, a harmful drug or a useless drug,” said study author Dr. John Whyte, director of the Moss Rehabilitation Research Institute in suburban Philadelphia.

Each year, an estimated 1.7 million Americans suffer a traumatic brain injury. Falls, car crashes, colliding with or getting hit by an object, and assaults are the leading causes. about three-quarters are concussions or other mild forms that heal over time. But about 52,000 people with brain injuries die each year and 275,000 are hospitalized, many with persistent, debilitating injuries, according to government figures.

The study didn’t include those with penetrating head injuries, such as gunshot wounds, but Giacino said the drug should have similar effects in those patients. whether it would work in patients with brain injuries not caused by trauma, such as a stroke, isn’t known.

A neurologist who wasn’t involved in the research called it an important step. But many questions remain, including whether people less severely injured would benefit, and whether amantadine actually improves patients’ long-term outcome or just speeds up their recovery.

Dr. Ramon Diaz-Arrastia said the results were welcome news in a field that has seen many failed efforts. He is director of clinical research at the government’s Center for Neuroscience and Regenerative Medicine, which works with the military and government scientists on brain injury research.

“It’s an important step toward developing better therapies,” he said.

“Hope is critical and false hope is cruel for families dealing with this,” Susan Connors, president and chief executive of the Brain Injury Association of America, in Vienna, Va, told the New York Times. The new findings are “a little piece of hope, the real kind,” she said.

Since amantadine is commonly used, Diaz-Arrastia said U.S. troops with severe brain injuries in Iraq or Afghanistan probably get it, or should get it now. since 2000, some 233,000 troops have suffered traumatic brain injuries, including about 6,100 serious cases, many of them from bomb blasts or shrapnel.

The CDC has more on traumatic brain injury.

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(CBS) do diets that claim to reduce symptoms of ADHD in kids actually work?

PICTURES: Does your child really have ADHD? 17 things to rule out first

A new review of ADHD diets by pediatric researchers suggests healthy eating could actually help kids reduce their ADHD symptoms. But the researchers warn a diet probably shoud not be the first line of defense against ADHD, but merely a supplement to other proven therapies such as medication.

“Supplemental diet therapy is simple, relatively inexpensive, and more acceptable to patient and parent,” the authors wrote in the review, published in the Jan. 9 issue of Pediatrics. “Public education regarding a healthy diet pattern and lifestyle to prevent or control ADHD may have greater long-term success.”

For the study, Dr. J. Gordon Millichap and Michelle M. Yee, researchers at Children’s Memorial Hospital and Northwestern University in Chicago, reviewed 70 studies on diet-based treatments for ADHD.

Some diets that have been thought to reduce symptoms of ADHD include the preservative-free Feingold Diet, a sugar-restricted diet, an “elimination diet” that avoids potential food allergens, and diets loaded with Omega-3 fatty acid supplements that supposedly boost brain health. What did the researchers have to say?

The Feingold Diet, which says to avoid foods like apples, grapes, luncheon meet, hot dogs, cold drinks, and anything else with orange and red dyes, was not proven to be effective by other studies, the researchers said. Parents who wish to follow this diet need patience, perseverance, and an understanding doctor and nutritionist, the authors wrote.

What about sugar? on the surface it seems giving a kid too much sugar can boost hyperactivity, but the researchers said the majority of studies it looked at failed to demonstrate that a diet high in sugar or artificial sweeteners had an effect on a child’s behavior or cognitive function, thus questioning the importance of a low-sugar diet for kids with ADHD. The authors realize despite their findings, the perception that sugar makes a kid more hyperactive is unlikely to change.

Did any of the diets actually work?

Supplementation with Omega-3 and Omega 6- fatty acids, often found in fish oil supplements, helped some children reduce their ADHD symptoms and get higher grades at school. But the benefit was not clearly demonstrated across the board.

“Most parents are enthusiastic about trying the diet supplements, despite our explanation of only possible benefit and lack of proof of efficacy,” the authors wrote. “In almost all cases, for treatment to be managed effectively, medication is also required”

Other studies suggested a reduction in ADHD symptoms from the elimination or “hypoallergenic” diet, which cuts out some common allergy-inducing foods like cow’s milk and cheese, nuts, wheat cereal, and chocolate, and replaces them with hypoallergenic foods like lamb, potatoes, tapioca, carrots, and pears.

“We find the hypoallergenic diet might be effective, but difficult for families to manage them,” Millichap told HealthDay.

What worked best? A  “healthy” diet rich in fish, vegetables, whole-grain foods, fruits, and legumes seemed to improve symptoms for kids of ADHD, by combating some unhealthy foods found in a “Western” diet such as red meats, fast food, and high-fat dairy products. one Australian study found kids who typically eat a Western-style diet were significantly more likely to have ADHD than kids who ate the healthy diet.

The authors wrote, “A greater attention to the education of parents and children in a healthy dietary pattern, omitting items shown to predispose to ADHD, is perhaps the most promising and practical complementary or alternative treatment of ADHD.”

Approximately 9.5 percent of U.S. kids – more than 5.4 million children – have ADHD.

WebMD has more on ADHD.

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(CBS) An experimental herpes vaccine failed to protect young women from the disease in a new study, dashing hopes that a vaccine may soon be available to help prevent the sexually transmitted disease.

PICTURES: Bogus STD cures: are you taking one?

In a study of 8,300 women ages 18 to 30, the vaccine, developed by GlaxoSmithKline, partially protected against HSV-1, the strain of herpes which typically causes cold sores but can also cause genital herpes. The vaccine, however, did not protect against HSV-2, the strain that most commonly causes genital herpes.

“There is some very good news in our findings. We were partially successful against half of the equation – protecting women from genital disease caused by HSV-1,” study author Dr. Robert Belshe, director of the Saint Louis University Center for Vaccine Development, said in a written statement.

None of the women had any strain of herpes when the study began, and half of the women were given the experimental vaccine while the other half were given a hepatitis a vaccine. Doctors monitored the women for twenty months, and throughout the study, some women got herpes.  The experimental vaccine was 58 percent effective at preventing genital herpes from HSV-1, but did not show protection against HSV-2. The study was published in the Jan. 5 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

Belshe said in the statement he was surprised the vaccine protected against one type of vaccine and not the other, but thinks that finding could lead to more research to better understand the disease.

“This is not the final vaccine,” Belshe told WebMD. “This information will help us a lot.”

Some experts aren’t as optimistic.

“I was very disappointed there wasn’t more of a benefit,” Dr. Bruce Hirsch, an attending physician in infectious diseases at North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset, N.Y., who wasn’t involved in the study, told HealthDay. “I’m concerned if we’ll ever find a vaccine effective for HSV-2.”

“Enough vaccines have failed that companies are seeing herpes vaccines as a risky business,” added Dr. David Knipe, a virologist at Harvard Medical School in Boston. Knipe told Nature News he thinks the public sector might need to fund herpes vaccine research to further advance it.

More than 50 million U.S. adults have herpes, according to WebMD, with up to 1.6 new infections occurring each year. Abstinence is the only way to prevent the STD, and latex condoms can reduce the risk of transmission, but the disease still can spread with condom use. The CDC says persons with herpes should abstain from sexual activity with uninfected partners when lesions or other symptoms are present. But even without symptoms, herpes can still spread to a partner.

The CDC has more on genital herpes.