“New” Ibuprofen May Trump Current Version for Pain Relief

Maybe soon you won’t have to worry about a heart health emergency when you pop an ibuprofen or two. It turns out that a new formulation of ibuprofen—ibuprofen arginate—might allow people to take higher doses without cardiovascular repercussions.

“While more experiments are required, our observations show that ibuprofen arginate provides, in one preparation, a COX-2 inhibitor and arginine supplement, ” said Jane A. Mitchell, Ph.D. in the October 14, 2016 news release. Dr. Mitchell is a researcher involved in the work and Head of Cardiothoracic Pharmacology, Cardiothoracic Pharmacology and Vascular Biology Section at the National Heart and Lung Institute at the Institute of Cardiovascular Medicine and Science at the Imperial College in London, England.

Dr. Mitchell told OTW, “Solving the problem of the cardiovascular side effects caused by anti-inflammatory drugs like ibuprofen is one of the most important challenges in drug research today. These side effects are the reason why there are no new drugs in this class and why they are now (since 2011) not used to prevent colon cancer. Our research suggests that L-arginine may prevent the cardiovascular side effects caused by these drugs.”

“If we are right, arginine formulations of anti-inflammatory drugs, such as ibuprofen, will be safer drugs because we think that they will protect the cardiovascular system from the harmful effects that these drugs have in the kidney and in blood vessels. However, there is no need to wait until we know if we are right or not because L-arginine formulations of ibuprofen are already currently available over the counter in many parts of the world. Until we do more tests however we would recommend that the current advice for all forms of ibuprofen be followed.”

“We suggest that arginine formulations of ibuprofen and other drugs in this class, particularly the coxibs, may well be the future of arthritis therapy.”