A new study suggests that taking ibuprofen before a trip to the mountains may help some people avoid the headaches and nausea that come with altitude sickness.

Still, both a study author and one altitude expert not involved in the research said the approach won’t help all travelers and climbers — and isn’t necessarily any better than taking prescription altitude-sickness drugs.

Even with ibuprofen, “there are still a lot of people who do have symptoms,” said Robert Roach, head of the Altitude Research Center at the University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine.

Because the body’s response to high altitudes varies person-by-person, there may be some people who do better with ibuprofen than with prescription drugs, including acetazolamide — which increases the amount of oxygen in the blood — and the steroid dexamethasone, he said.

But the opposite is also true.

“There are for sure going to be some people where ibuprofen doesn’t do much,” Roach told Reuters Health.

Research has suggested ibuprofen, marketed as Advil, among other brand names, helps relieve symptoms in people who already have altitude sickness — which typically feels like a hangover, according to Roach, who wasn’t part of the study team.

Researchers wanted to see if the over-the-counter drug could prevent those symptoms before they started.

For the study, volunteers were driven and hiked a few miles from an altitude of about 4,000 feet to over 12,000 feet in the White Mountains of California during the summer of 2010. half of them were given 600 milligrams of ibuprofen three times during the day, starting six hours before the ascent. The other half took a drug-free placebo pill.

Researchers asked the participants about their altitude-related symptoms, including headaches, dizziness and nausea after they finished their trip and again in the morning after a night spent at altitude.

Out of the 86 participants in the study, 43 percent of those given ibuprofen reported symptoms of altitude sickness, compared to 69 percent of those on the placebo pills instead.

Eight of the volunteers had symptoms serious enough to warrant treatment — six who had taken ibuprofen and two in the comparison group, the research team reported in the Annals of Emergency Medicine.

Dr. Jeffrey Gertsch from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and his colleagues calculated that four people would need to take ibuprofen before and during their high-altitude trip to prevent one from getting sick.

False sense of security?

Gertsch said one big question his team’s study can’t answer is whether ibuprofen is just easing altitude symptoms by providing pain relief or if it’s really getting at the underlying causes of those symptoms, including inflammation and changes in blood vessels.

If it’s only easing pain, he said, that could actually be worrisome for climbers.

“You could have a false sense of security… and get yourself into real trouble” at higher altitudes with low oxygen, Gertsch told Reuters Health.

Researchers will need to find objective ways to measure altitude sickness, besides patients’ perceived pain and nausea, to try to answer that question, he added.

The researchers agreed that ibuprofen is an option for people who’d rather not take prescription drugs, which may cause side effects. Acetazolamide comes with a risk of nausea and fatigue — symptoms of altitude sickness itself — and dexamethasone may raise blood sugar levels and disturb sleep. And ibuprofen costs pennies per pill.

“People would be welcome to try it… and see how it works for them,” Roach said — assuming they realize ibuprofen can also come with side effects, including stomach problems.

“If people want to use this to prevent altitude sickness, I’m not going to say that’s bad, they just need to be very careful,” Gertsch added.

When it comes to high-altitude climbing, he said, “there is no substitute for careful planning, which is staged ascent, just going slow.”

AURORA, Colo. (March 8, 2011) — In a major breakthrough in the battle against Parkinson’s disease, researchers at the University of Colorado School of Medicine have discovered a drug that stops the progression of the degenerative illness in mice and is now being tested in humans.

“Drugs currently used to treat Parkinson’s disease just treat symptoms; they do not stop the disease from getting worse,” said senior author Curt Freed, MD, who heads the division of Clinical Pharmacology and Toxicology at the CU School of Medicine. “We’ve now discovered that we can prevent the progression of the disease by turning on a protective gene in the brain.”

The results have been published on line in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, jbc.org/content/early/2011/03/03/jbc.M110.211029.full.pdf+html.

Lead author Wenbo Zhou, PhD, Assistant Professor of Medicine, and Freed, a national pioneer in Parkinson’s research, have found that the drug phenylbutyrate turns on a gene that can protect dopamine neurons in Parkinson’s disease. The gene, called DJ-1, can increase production of antioxidants like glutathione to reduce the debilitating effects of excess oxygen in brain cells. In addition, activating DJ-1 helps cells eliminate abnormal proteins that otherwise accumulate and kill brain cells. Dopamine neurons are particularly susceptible to too much oxygen and abnormal protein deposits. Parkinson’s disease is caused by dying midbrain dopamine neurons.

Zhou and Freed have studied the DJ-1 gene since 2003 when a European group discovered that mutations in DJ-1 could cause Parkinson’s disease. The Colorado scientists immediately started work to see why the gene was so important and have published a series of papers on the subject since 2005. but to convert their findings into a practical treatment for Parkinson’s disease, they needed to find a drug to turn on the DJ-1 gene.

“we know some drugs can turn on genes. For example, steroids like testosterone act on genes in muscle cells to create muscle bulk,” said Freed.

After testing many drugs, the team found that phenylbutyrate could activate DJ-1 and keep dopamine neurons from dying. Next, they put the drug in the drinking water of mice genetically programmed to get Parkinson’s disease as they aged.

Aging mice receiving the drug were able to move normally, had no decline in mental function, and their brains did not accumulate the protein that causes Parkinson’s. by contrast, older animals that did not get the drug saw a steady decline in their ability to move as their brains were damaged by abnormal proteins.

The researchers began giving phenylbutyrate to people in 2009, to test the safety of the drug in Parkinson patients.

Zhou and Freed will publish the human results in the coming months.

“we look forward to a future when Parkinson patients will be able to take a pill that will turn on the DJ-1 gene and stop the progressive disability associated with the illness,” Freed said. “right now, when you get the diagnosis of Parkinson’s, you can expect to have a steady decline in the ability to move. while drugs like L-DOPA are very important for generating dopamine in the brain and making movement possible, these drugs have little impact on the ongoing deterioration of the patients’ own brain cells.”

Over one million people in the United State have the disease which usually strikes those in their 50s and 60s. Patients have a decline in their ability to walk, talk, and write because of slow movement and rigid muscles. they develop tremors and reflexes slow down. The current treatment of Parkinson’s is based on drugs that increase dopamine production in the brain.

Freed is a national leader in transplanting dopamine cells into the human brain to relieve symptoms. he and his neurosurgical colleague Robert Breeze, MD, have done the operation in 61 patients, more than any other group in the world. The procedure can replace the need for drugs but even cell transplants do not prevent the progression of the disease.

Freed and Zhou are now looking for other drugs that might turn on the DJ-1 gene. One drawback of phenylbutyrate is that patients must take very large doses, 16 grams per day or 32 large tablets taken at frequent intervals. while the drug is approved by the FDA for treating a rare genetic disease in infants, whether it can stop Parkinson’s in people remains to be seen.

But Zhou and Freed believe the discovery offers new hope for those suffering from Parkinson’s disease.

“if we can say to someone that as of today we can stop your disease from getting worse, that would be a truly significant achievement,” Freed said.

Faculty at the University of Colorado School of Medicine work to advance science and improve care. these faculty members include physicians, educators and scientists at University of Colorado Hospital, The Children’s Hospital, Denver Health, National Jewish Health, and the Denver Veterans Affairs Medical Center. Degrees offered by the UC Denver School of Medicine include doctor of medicine, doctor of physical therapy, and masters of physician assistant studies. The School is located on the University of Colorado’s Anschutz Medical Campus, one of four campuses in the University of Colorado system. For additional news and information, please visit the UC Denver newsroom online.