Recovery from abdominal surgery is often slowed by a temporary paralysis of the intestines known as ileus, but in a recent phase II clinical trial, prucalopride--a drug that stimulates motility--cut the risk of ileus lasting for more than 5 days in half.
In 110 patients undergoing abdominal surgery, only 16.4% of patients taking prucalopride for up to 7 days after surgery experienced ileus, compared with 34.5% of patients taking a placebo.
"Additional studies are warranted to validate our findings and assess the effect of prucalopride in patients with established prolonged post-operative ileus," said Prof. Weiming Zhu, co-author of the Alimentary Pharmacology & Therapeutics study.
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Citation: Gong, J., Xie, Z., Zhang, T., Gu, L., Yao, W., Guo, Z., Li, Y., Lu, N., Zhu, W., Li, N. and Li, J. (2016), Randomised clinical trial: prucalopride, a colonic pro-motility agent, reduces the duration of post-operative ileus after elective gastrointestinal surgery. Alimentary Pharmacology & Therapeutics. doi: 10.1111/apt.13557
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