maxwellc

Bodywork: Can creatine supplements help in Alzheimer’s?

July 21, 2026 by maxwellc

Adam’s Journal

Here’s a question from a reader:

A friend has been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. A neurologist mentioned a study about the positive effects of creatine supplementation for cognitive function. Could creatine help in Alzheimer’s?

Suzy Morgan

Dr. Scofield Prescribes

There actually have been two recent studies on this topic.

The first was a systematic review of 16 randomized trials of creatine involving nearly 500 adults. While none of the 16 studies involved participants with Alzheimer’s, all of them looked at the impact of creatine on cognitive function.

The review found that creatine produced a relatively small benefit for memory. It also seemed to improve response time on certain attention and information-processing tests. But it didn’t substantially improve overall cognition or executive function.

The second study is a clinical trial that looked specifically at creatine supplementation in people with Alzheimer’s. It produced some promising results, but the research had significant limitations.

In the study, 20 people with Alzheimer’s took a high dose of creatine daily for eight weeks. At the conclusion of the study, participants performed better on a series of cognitive assessments that measured cognition, memory and attention span. They also showed increased levels of creatine in the brain, may improve the brain’s energy reserves and, potentially, cognitive function.

This study, conducted by scientists at the University of Kansas, represented the first human trial of creatine in people with Alzheimer’s. But before we get too excited about its results, it’s important to understand why we shouldn’t read too much into them.

The study was small and lasted only eight weeks. There was no placebo arm of the trial – in other words, everyone received creatine – so researchers couldn’t compare the results to a similar group of patients who didn’t receive the supplement.

This last part is particularly relevant, because participants repeated the same tests to measure cognition. So, at least part of the improvements could have been attributable to what’s known as the practice effect, which simply means that you get better at something the more you repeat it.

To understand if these preliminary results are meaningful, we’d need a larger, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. That trial should also last substantially longer than eight weeks and, if possible, measure not only test scores but also everyday function and disease biomarkers.

As a whole, research on creatine suggests that it might produce modest benefits for memory, particularly in older adults and people with low dietary creatine (like some vegetarians). However, the results are inconsistent.

The bottom line: creatine is promising enough to warrant further study – but at this point there’s insufficient evidence to recommend it as a treatment for Alzheimer’s.

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Dr. Hal Scofield is a physician-scientist at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation, and he also serves as Associate Chief of Staff for Research at the Oklahoma City VA Medical Center. Adam Cohen is OMRF’s senior vice president and general counsel. Send your health questions to contact@omrf.org.

Bodywork: Don’t let ticks ruin a good vacation

July 14, 2026 by maxwellc

Adam’s Journal

Some friends are heading to Massachusetts. They’re excited to escape the Oklahoma heat, but they’re concerned about ticks, and especially Lyme disease. How worried should they be? And what should they do to protect themselves?

Dr. Scofield Prescribes

Our awareness of Lyme disease is a relatively recent phenomenon. It was formally recognized in 1975, after a mysterious outbreak of children experiencing severe arthritis in Lyme, Connecticut. Six years later, scientists discovered the bacterium, carried by blacklegged ticks, that causes the illness.

However, like the arachnids that transmit it, it turns out the disease itself has been here much longer. Researchers have since found bacterial evidence of Lyme in a 5,300-year-old mummy.

In recent years, cases of Lyme – again, like the population of ticks – have exploded. Experts now estimate that almost a half-million Americans contract Lyme annually, all from tick bites.

The blacklegged ticks that carry Lyme have not yet been detected in Oklahoma. But they’re common in New England, and their range, which now covers well over half the country, continues to spread.

Lyme can be treated effectively with antibiotics, especially if begun soon after infection. Still, up to 20% end up with what’s known as post-treatment Lyme disease, a confounding array of long-term symptoms like fatigue, brain fog and dizziness.

Other tick-borne diseases are also on the rise. Oklahoma routinely leads the nation in Rocky Mountain spotted fever cases. And alpha-gal syndrome, an unusual allergic reaction once only seen in southern and midwestern states, including Oklahoma, has now spread to Massachusetts and the Northeast.

The surest way to prevent all of these conditions is not to get bitten by a tick.

Ticks typically live close to the ground in humid environments like forest floors or in tall grasses or weeds. When venturing into spaces like this, the best defense is to cover up. It’s even better if clothing (but not skin) is treated with an insecticide called permethrin, which you can spray onto clothes and kills ticks before they have a chance to bite. Treating all clothing, including shoes, with permethrin is especially effective, as young ticks – nymphs – live close to the ground, while mature ones usually latch onto people around knee-level.

If you opt not to cover up fully, which may be uncomfortable in summer weather, products applied directly to the skin that repel mosquitoes will also repel ticks. Use DEET or picaridin, which are approved by the Environmental Protection Agency for use as safe and effective insect repellents. Synthetic chemicals like these are most effective, while repellents branded as “natural” or “organic” generally don’t work as well.

Wear light-colored clothing, which makes it easy to spot ticks. When coming home from tick-populated areas, check all clothing and skin for ticks.

If you find one, don’t panic, even if it’s bitten you. Ticks must be attached to humans for at least a full day, and often closer to 36 hours, before transmitting Lyme disease.

Remove ticks using fine-tipped tweezers. Contact a healthcare provider if one was attached for more than 24 hours – or if you develop a rash around the bite, fever, chills or other symptoms in the weeks that follow.

Bodywork: A different type of diabetes

July 7, 2026 by maxwellc

Adam’s Journal

Here’s a question from a reader:

I read an interview with someone who said they were diagnosed with type 1.5 diabetes. What is this disease exactly?

Susan Kovats

Dr. Scofield Prescribes

As its name suggests, type 1.5 diabetes – now known as latent autoimmune diabetes (LADA) – is a form of the disease that shares characteristics with both type 1 and type 2 diabetes.

Let’s start with a quick overview of the two types of diabetes people know best. Type 1 is an autoimmune disease that most often takes hold in childhood. Type 2 more typically develops later in life, usually due to a combination of factors like genetics, excess weight, physical inactivity and age.

Both of these forms of diabetes are marked by problems with insulin, a hormone that turns food into energy. In both, your body can’t make enough insulin or can’t use it properly. This leads to high blood sugar, which can require lifelong insulin treatments.

LADA is a slowly progressing form of autoimmune diabetes. It develops when the body’s immune system mistakenly begins attacking the cells that produce insulin. So, in this way, it is like type 1 diabetes.

However, the disease usually develops in adulthood, most commonly over the age of 30. This later onset is a characteristic LADA shares with type 2 diabetes. And like type 2, LADA progresses slowly.

As a result, physicians often mistake LADA for type 2 diabetes. An estimated 4-14% of patients diagnosed with type 2 diabetes may actually have LADA.

So, what does this mean?

If LADA is misdiagnosed as type 2 diabetes, doctors frequently start patients on non-insulin treatments. And while these approaches – which include the drug metformin, various inhibitors, and GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Mounjaro – can be effective for type 2 diabetes, they don’t help people with LADA.

For LADA, the course of treatment mirrors that for type 1 diabetes: beginning low-dose insulin injections and controlling blood sugar through diet and exercise. And like type 1 diabetes, LADA requires this therapeutic regimen to continue throughout a patient’s life.

If a person starts showing symptoms of diabetes later in life – excessive thirst, frequent urination, unexplained weight loss – chances are it’s type 2. However, it could be LADA. Some of the telltale clues are what’s not there: high blood pressure, excess weight, a family history of type 2 diabetes, a response to non-insulin drugs. If some or all of these factors are missing, LADA may be the answer.

Bodywork: What if the Founding Fathers had lived today?

June 30, 2026 by maxwellc

Adam’s Journal

Happy 250^th, America! Our nation’s big birthday celebration has me thinking about – what else? – health. But with a colonial spin.

The Founding Fathers are often depicted as old men when they were doing things like leading the Continental Army against the British or penning the Declaration of Independence. However, I thought lifespans were a lot shorter in 1776.

I’m curious – how did folks like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin live so long? And would they have lived even longer today?

Dr. Scofield Prescribes

For someone born in British colonial America in the early to mid-1700s, life expectancy at birth was generally about 35 to 40 years. Those figures, though, are a bit deceiving; infant and childhood mortality dragged them down dramatically.

In many areas, up to 20% of babies died before age 1. And even those who survived beyond the crib were not out of the woods; infectious illnesses like smallpox, measles and diphtheria, along with dysentery and diarrheal diseases brought on by contaminated food and water, claimed many a child’s life.

Nevertheless, if you made it to age 20, you could expect to live another four decades or more. So, Washington (who lived to age 67), Jefferson (83) and Franklin (84) weren’t extreme outliers.

Like many wealthier colonists, they had certain advantages that tilted the actuarial odds in their favor. They enjoyed better nutrition and more stable food supplies, better housing, less physically demanding labor, and access to physicians.

Still, if this trio of Founding Fathers had been born in the mid-20^th century, odds are they would have enjoyed even longer lives.

Washington developed a severe sore throat after riding for hours in cold, wet weather. Within a day, he could barely breathe or swallow.

Medical historians believe he was suffering from an acute bacterial infection. But bacterial infections – now quite treatable – were unknown two-plus centuries ago. So, his doctors treated him with standard therapies of the day, which included enemas and bloodletting.

Not surprisingly, the treatments didn’t help. And the bloodletting, which removed an estimated 40% of his blood volume, may well have hastened his demise.

The picture is not quite as stark for Franklin and Jefferson. Franklin developed lung problems likely caused by pneumonia that ultimately proved fatal. Jefferson seems to have succumbed to chronic kidney disease, possibly complicated by pneumonia or another infection.

Today, the picture would look quite different. Antibiotics, along with some inpatient support, would likely have restored Washington’s health. A similar course of therapy would probably have added years to Franklin’s life. And blood pressure control, dialysis, antibiotics and a possible kidney transplant might well have done the same for Jefferson.

When America was born, doctors couldn’t detect bacteria, couldn’t measure blood pressure, and had no antibiotics. Since then, medicine has undergone its own revolution. On our nation’s 250^th birthday, that’s certainly something worth celebrating.

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Dr. Hal Scofield is a physician-scientist at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation, and he also serves as Associate Chief of Staff for Research at the Oklahoma City VA Medical Center. He is currently pursuing a master’s degree in medical history from Johns Hopkins University. Adam Cohen is a curious guy and is also OMRF’s senior vice president and general counsel. Send your health questions to contact@omrf.org.

Bodywork: Do men snore more than women?

June 23, 2026 by maxwellc

Adam’s Journal

I guess it’s no surprise that we have health-curious coworkers at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation. Here’s the latest question from an inquisitive colleague:

My husband snores so loudly at night sometimes that it keeps me awake. A lot of my friends say the same thing about their husbands. Do men tend to snore more than women – or does it just seem that way?

Casey Arnold

Dr. Scofield Prescribes

Your perception is correct: Men do snore more than women.

The American Academy of Sleep Medicine reports that about 40% of adult men are habitual snorers, while adult women habitually snore at just over half that rate – about 24%. A 2022 review article in the sleep-medicine literature cites similar figures.

An analysis of 63 different research studies on snoring found a consistent male predominance in snoring. In particular, it found this sex disparity was most pronounced in younger adulthood. To understand why, let’s look at what causes snoring.

Snoring occurs when airways vibrate or collapse during sleep. Most often, this happens when structures in the upper airway – between your voice box and your nose and mouth – vibrate.

The area most often involved is the space between the soft palate and tongue, which narrows and becomes floppy during sleep. This happens more frequently in men because they tend to have larger neck circumferences, more fat around the neck and upper body, and longer airways.

In addition, the female sex hormones estrogen and progesterone appear to help maintain airway muscle tone, reducing its tendency to collapse.

However, after menopause, these hormone levels decline. As a result, snoring – and its more disruptive and dangerous cousin, obstructive sleep apnea – becomes more common in women, and the sex gap narrows.

Across age groups, men are diagnosed with obstructive sleep apnea two to three times more frequently than women. The same factors that increase the risk for snoring also increase the chances of obstructive sleep apnea.

Some researchers have noted that women – perhaps out of embarrassment – are less likely to report snoring to healthcare providers than men. So, statistics may underreport the levels of snoring in females.

Still, when researchers objectively record snoring during sleep studies, they find that men snore more frequently and loudly. And that, I suspect, is not a surprise to you or your friends.

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Bodywork: Fathers, sons and familial tremors

June 16, 2026 by maxwellc

Adam’s Journal

With Father’s Day around the corner, I’ve been thinking about my dad, who passed away two years ago this month.

I always remember him – and his father before him – having a slight tremor in his hand. He would have a drink or two to calm it, but especially in his later years, that was not enough.

In his 80s and, finally, his 90s, the shaking in his hands became so pronounced that it was debilitating. He was nearly unable to type on a computer keyboard, and simply signing his name was an arduous task that could take the better part of an hour.

Given this familial history, are my brother and I destined to inherit this condition?

Dr. Scofield Prescribes

Commonly called familial tremor, what you’re describing sounds like what’s known more technically as essential tremor. It’s a neurological condition that runs in families.

Unlike Parkinson’s disease, which also causes shaking in the hands but is accompanied by a host of other neurological symptoms, essential tremor primarily causes tremors and is generally not associated with the progressive neurological decline seen in Parkinson’s. That said – and as you described – it can nevertheless have a profound impact on one’s quality of life and ability to perform countless day-to-day tasks.

There is, as you’ve surmised, a strong genetic component to essential tremor. But the fact that your father and paternal grandfather had the condition does not predestine you, your brother or any other siblings to their fate.

Essential tremor shares many characteristics with what are called “autosomal dominant” disorders. These are conditions where, if one parent has them, each child (regardless of sex) has a 50% chance of inheriting them.

However, research has found that no single gene causes essential tremor. Multiple genes likely contribute.

So while the overall risk for you and each of your siblings inheriting the genes that predispose you to the condition is still likely in the neighborhood of a coin flip, the picture is much more complicated than that.

I promise this is the end of the genetics lesson, but essential tremor displays a trait that geneticists call variable penetrance. Put simply, it means that just because you inherit the genes doesn’t mean you’ll develop the condition.

And even if you do, your symptoms may not be as severe as your father’s were.

We don’t fully understand why this is the case. Environmental factors may also play a role, influencing whether symptoms surface and, if they do, how profound they might be.

I’d encourage you to pay attention to fine-motor tasks: things like signing documents, holding a cup of coffee, or taking photos with a smartphone.

Even a subtle tremor would be a signal. With you now in your late 50s, symptoms would typically, but not always, begin to appear by this time. If you haven’t seen any symptoms, it’s an encouraging sign that you will not continue this family legacy.

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Bodywork: Anti-aging drugs – for dogs?

June 9, 2026 by maxwellc

Adam’s Journal

I read an article about anti-aging drugs for dogs. Last I checked, we hadn’t even developed such a thing for people. Is this for real? And what might it mean – or not – for we two-legged creatures?

Dr. Criley Prescribes

It is, indeed, for real. Right now, there are two major trials of anti-aging drugs for dogs.

The first is for a drug called rapamycin. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has already approved human use of rapamycin to prevent transplant rejection and to treat some types of cancer. Now, some people have begun taking it off-label to slow aging.

Researchers have begun a trial of rapamycin in dogs to look at a variety of health outcomes. One of them is whether weekly doses of the drug in older dogs leads to longer lifespans.

The second trial involves an investigational compound known as LOY-002. The experimental drug claims to target metabolic drivers of aging and, in early results, has been shown to reduce certain biomarkers – essentially, measurements of chemicals or processes – associated with aging.

The drug’s maker is now conducting a larger trial on dogs 10 years or older. Specifically, researchers are testing whether dogs who receive daily doses of the drug will live longer than their canine counterparts taking placebos.

This drug’s development represents a critical shift in thinking. Instead of targeting specific conditions related to aging – conditions like heart disease, diabetes and neurological disorders – LOY-002 is targeting the process of aging itself.

It’s too early to tell whether either of these drug trials will be successful. But if they are, which would be signaled by approval from the FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine, many dog owners would no doubt add the medications to their pets’ routine care.

While optimal nutrition, exercise and veterinary care will remain crucial to dogs’ health and well-being, these drugs could give us more time with our four-legged family members. And that would be a very good thing!

We humans share much with our canine companions, including the aging process and many of the diseases accompanying it. If either of these trials proves out, it could pave the way for anti-aging medications for people – and carry profound implications for us all.

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Dr. Jennie Criley is the attending veterinarian and director of comparative medicine at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation. Adam Cohen is OMRF’s senior vice president and general counsel. Submit your health questions to contact@omrf.org.

Are peptides all they’re cracked up to be?

June 2, 2026 by maxwellc

Adam’s Journal

In my (deep sigh) seemingly never-ending odyssey to heal my torn hamstring, I recently visited a physician who suggested that I try peptides. I’ve heard a lot about them lately, but I confess I don’t really know what they are. Are peptides a safe and effective option for injuries like mine?

Dr. Scofield Prescribes

Yes, peptides seem to be all the rage these days. Wellness influencers, tech moguls and even our Secretary of Health and Human Services are trumpeting the promise of peptides for everything from skin care and building muscle to longer lives.

Peptides are short chains of amino acids – basically fragments of proteins. They occur naturally in our bodies and play many useful roles in our cells, including helping digestion, regulating blood pressure and reducing inflammation.

Peptides can also be synthesized and turned into medications. There are several peptide therapies approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Some that you might know are insulin and GLP-1 drugs. (Fun fact: the P in GLP-1 stands for peptide.)

Beyond these FDA-approved therapies is a much larger “gray market” of peptides. Until 2023, compounding pharmacies could make certain other peptides when prescribed by a doctor. But due to safety concerns, the FDA removed a group of them from the list that compounding pharmacies could make.

These peptides, which are marketed for a wide variety of health benefits and therapies, have largely been untested in humans. They’re primarily manufactured in China, and those who’ve analyzed them have found that what’s being advertised isn’t always what’s actually being sold to buyers. The products also can be tainted.

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has declared himself “a big fan of peptides.” He says he has used peptides to treat injuries he’s suffered, “with really good effect.”

Kennedy announced that in July, the FDA will evaluate seven of the most popular ones. Most observers believe this signals that the agency will soon allow compounding pharmacies to make them again.

On the list are two peptides – known as BPC-157 and TB-500 – that have been shown in pre-clinical trials to combat inflammation and promote tissue healing.

A 2025 paper from researchers at the University of Utah looked at the research studies conducted with BPC-157. They determined that while studies involving animals and cell cultures, along with small human studies, suggested the peptide held potential to promote healing, “human data are extremely limited,” and “rigorous, large-scale trials are lacking.”

The data are even more limited on TB-500. A review of the two peptides in The American Journal of Sports Medicine this year noted that research studies had yet to generate reliable human data on the peptides’ safety, side effects, proper dosage, or which conditions they should – or shouldn’t – be used to treat.

Against this uncertain backdrop, I would strongly caution against using peptides. Unless and until large-scale human clinical trials demonstrate peptides’ safety and effectiveness, anyone who takes them is simply experimenting upon themselves.

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Charles T. Esmon, Ph.D.

May 28, 2026 by maxwellc

Dr. Charles Esmon died May 1, 2026. An OMRF Distinguished Career Scientist, Chuck was 79. While many tremendous scientists have called OMRF home, Chuck was perhaps the most talented and accomplished ever to do so.

A self-described “country boy” who grew up on an Illinois farm, Chuck and his wife, Naomi, came to Oklahoma after earning their PhDs at Washington University in St. Louis, although Chuck first made a detour to the University of Wisconsin for postdoctoral studies. Naomi planted her flag in Dr. Jordan Tang’s lab at OMRF, while Chuck joined Dr. Fletcher Taylor at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center. Naomi eventually relocated to Fletcher’s lab at OUHSC, and then in 1982, all three moved across the street to OMRF – this time with Naomi as a part of Chuck’s research team.

“She didn’t want to work with me initially,” recalled Chuck in an interview years later with Findings magazine, “because I had a reputation for being difficult to work with.” However, the collaboration that followed would prove anything but difficult. In the ensuing three-plus decades, with Naomi’s support, Chuck made a series of paradigm-shifting discoveries about blood clotting and how it relates to inflammation.

That work is today enshrined in textbooks. It also led to the development of two drugs that received approval from the Food and Drug Administration: Xigris, to treat severe sepsis, and Ceprotin, a therapy for people with a rare blood disorder. While drugmaker Eli Lilly removed Xigris from the market a decade after its approval, Ceprotin remains available in hospitals and clinics around the world, where physicians use it to treat patients with a life-threatening deficiency of protein C in their blood.

In 1988, Chuck became the first scientist outside of a university to be named a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, one of the highest honors in medical research and an appointment that he held for a quarter century. He also garnered many other plaudits, including a MERIT Award from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, the American Heart Association’s Basic Research Prize, the Robert J. and Claire Pasarow Foundation Award in Cardiovascular Research, the Robert P. Grant Medal from the International Society on Thrombosis and Haemostasis, and election to the National Academy of Sciences.

When Chuck joined the National Academy, Fletcher Taylor – who maintained a robust scientific partnership with Chuck throughout their careers – reflected on what made his friend and OMRF colleague special as a scientist. “It all starts with Chuck Esmon’s hands. The fluid, sure movements at the laboratory bench mask what is a complex job. This carries over into his writing; he thinks and writes in paragraphs, not sentences. All words and phrases find their places in a current of complex ideas.” Over the years, Fletcher said, he “delighted in watching and being repeatedly helped by Chuck.” But, he said, what he loved most was that Chuck was “a caregiver at heart.”

In the final years of his career at OMRF, Chuck had the opportunity to spend time with patients whose lives were saved by his work. Following one such meeting, Chuck told The Oklahoman, with characteristic understatement, “I always thought we would be able to do something that would actually be useful. To me, that was a big deal.”

Outside of the lab, Chuck and Naomi, who passed away in 2025, enjoyed skiing, deep-sea diving, underwater photography, and raising and caring for many dogs over the years. After retiring from OMRF in 2019, he continued as a Distinguished Career Scientist until his death.

The late Dr. Paul Kincade, a long-time OMRF colleague, may have put it best in 2015, when Chuck garnered yet another well-deserved scientific honor. “Oklahoma is blessed to have some very accomplished scientists, and Chuck Esmon may be the best of them. Again and again, he has made discoveries that really matter and ones that impact human health.”

Bodywork: Will a new name improve care for a medical condition?

May 26, 2026 by maxwellc

Adam’s Journal

This week, we have a question from Carli Hartley, our co-worker at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation:

Polycystic ovarian syndrome was recently renamed polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome in hopes that it would help improve care for this disorder that impacts 1 in 8 women. As someone with the condition, I’m curious how this name change will help improve care. And will it help increase research on this disorder?

Dr. Scofield Prescribes

Polycystic ovarian syndrome has been a misnomer for almost a century. Doctors first described the condition in 1935. Their characterization was based only on seven women, each of whom had enlarged ovaries with multiple small cysts.

However, we now know these cysts were just the tip of the iceberg. And, in fact, many patients diagnosed with the condition don’t have ovarian cysts at all.

Confused?

To allay this confusion, an international consortium of physicians and researchers has renamed the condition. The new name, polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome (PMOS), not only gets rid of the cysts, but it points to the broader underlying nature of the condition.

PMOS affects an estimated 10-13% of women of reproductive age. A diagnosis requires two of the following three elements: (1) irregular periods; (2) evidence of elevated levels of the hormone androgen; (3) multiple ovarian cysts.

In addition to irregular periods and ovarian cysts, the condition can be marked by symptoms like pelvic pain, excess body hair and acne. Many with PMOS also have an increased risk of obesity, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and obstructive sleep apnea.

Beyond failing to accurately characterize the condition, the previous name also didn’t capture its scope. The new name attempts to correct these flaws and also recognizes its roots: the endocrine system, a network of glands and organs that act as the body’s chemical messaging system.

By moving PMOS beyond the realm of gynecology and a focus on the ovaries, experts hope it will broaden caregivers’ approaches to treatment. In particular, their aim is to shift the focus from PMOS’ impact on reproduction to encompass its many other effects.

The change could have an immediate impact for some patients, prompting doctors to recommend more screening for metabolic and cardiovascular problems. Today, if patients aren’t trying to get pregnant, they’re often prescribed birth control for their symptoms. With a broader understanding of the condition, more treatments may emerge.

Still, more research is needed, and the new name also aims to spur those studies. Until now, federal grant applications were typically directed to the institute at the National Institutes of Health that covers reproductive health, which has a relatively small budget. Those in the field now hope that, with the change, PMOS research will become eligible for support from other, better-funded NIH institutes, like those that cover diabetes and heart disease.

Over time, let’s hope this name change will, as one researcher put it, “redirect us into thinking about this as a long-term chronic condition and not just a period problem.”

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