A new study from Emory University offers hope in the fight against antibiotic-resistant infections, a growing global health threat. Published in PNAS, the research focuses on a dangerous hospital-acquired bacterium called Acinetobacter baumannii.
This bug often infects people who are already very sick—such as patients on ventilators or those with weakened immune systems—and is notoriously hard to treat due to its resistance to many antibiotics.
The researchers took a creative approach: instead of looking for entirely new antibiotics, they searched for weaknesses that are unique to drug-resistant bacteria. Then, they tested existing drugs to see if any could exploit those weaknesses. What they found was surprising and promising.
An old heart medication called fendiline, once used to treat abnormal heart rhythms, turned out to be highly effective against A. baumannii. The drug kills the bacteria by disrupting a key process it needs to survive: a system that transports lipoproteins, which are essential for the structure and function of the bacterial cell.
Interestingly, this lipoprotein pathway seems to be weaker in drug-resistant strains of the bacteria. That makes fendiline especially effective against the very strains that are the hardest to treat with traditional antibiotics. Even better, fendiline does not seem to harm helpful bacteria that live in the gut, which are often wiped out by standard antibiotics.
“This is a critical breakthrough,” said Dr. Philip Rather, the senior author of the study and a professor at Emory University School of Medicine. “We urgently need new treatments for these infections, especially for patients who are already very ill and have limited options.”
Dr. Jennifer Colquhoun, the study’s first author, added, “This finding takes a drug that’s already FDA-approved and gives it a new purpose. It targets a specific weakness in resistant bacteria and could lead to faster development of new treatments.”
Because fendiline has already been tested for safety in humans, it could move through clinical trials more quickly than a brand-new drug. This could make it available sooner to patients suffering from life-threatening infections that no longer respond to current antibiotics.
The study’s results are especially important for hospitals, where superbugs like A. baumannii can spread quickly and are hard to control. If fendiline proves effective in larger trials, it could become a key tool in fighting these infections—especially in high-risk settings like intensive care units.
In short, this research breathes new life into an old medication, offering a smart and speedy way to combat one of the biggest threats in modern medicine: drug-resistant bacteria.
If you care about heart health, please read studies that vitamin K helps cut heart disease risk by a third, and a year of exercise reversed worrisome heart failure.
For more health information, please see recent studies about supplements that could help prevent heart disease, stroke, and results showing this food ingredient may strongly increase heart disease death risk.
The research findings can be found in PNAS.
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