Chest
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Review Meta Analysis
The Impact of Visceral Pleural Invasion In Node-negative Non-small-cell Lung cancer: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.
Visceral pleural invasion (VPI) is considered an aggressive and invasive factor in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Recent studies found that depending on tumor size, VPI influences T stage, but there is no consensus on whether VPI is important in node-negative NSCLC. In addition, its role in stage IB NSCLC is still uncertain. In this meta-analysis, we assessed the role of VPI in node-negative NSCLC according to various tumor sizes and especially in stage IB disease. ⋯ VPI together with tumor size has a synergistic effect on survival in node-negative NSCLC. Patients with stage IB NSCLC and larger tumor size with VPI might be considered for adjuvant chemotherapy after surgical resection and need careful preoperative evaluation and postoperative follow-up. Further randomized clinical trials to determine the impact of adjuvant chemotherapy in patients with stage IB NSCLC with VPI are warranted.
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Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a progressive, fatal disease. Until recently, the standard therapy for this disease has been essentially supportive, with the exception of a minority of patients who were eligible for lung transplantation. The development pathway for novel medications for IPF has been complicated. ⋯ In October 2014, these two drugs became the first agents to be approved by the US Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of IPF. (Pirfenidone had already been approved in several countries outside the United States.) In November 2014, the European Medicines Agency approved the use of nintedanib for IPF. The landscape for management of IPF has markedly changed with the advent of approved therapeutic options for IPF. In this article, we review the strategies that are being used to increase the likelihood of success in clinical development programs of novel disease-modifying agents in IPF.
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Multicenter Study
Dedicated severe asthma services improve healthcare utilisation and quality of life.
Systematic assessment of severe asthma can be used to confirm the diagnosis, identify comorbidities, and address adherence to therapy. However, the prospective usefulness of this approach is yet to be established. The objective of this study was to determine whether the systematic assessment of severe asthma is associated with improved quality of life (QoL) and health-care use and, using prospective data collection, to compare relevant outcomes in patients referred with severe asthma to specialist centers across the United Kingdom. ⋯ To our knowledge, this is the first time that a prospective study has shown that a systematic assessment at a dedicated severe asthma center is associated with improved QoL and asthma control and a reduction in health-care use and oral steroid burden.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Response to Fluid Boluses in the Fluid and Catheter Treatment Trial.
Recent emphasis has been placed on methods to predict fluid responsiveness, but the usefulness of using fluid boluses to increase cardiac index in critically ill patients with ineffective circulation or oliguria remains unclear. ⋯ In this cohort of critically ill patients with ARDS who were previously resuscitated, the rate of fluid responsiveness was low, and fluid boluses only led to small hemodynamic changes.
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Atrial fibrillation (AF) that newly occurs during critical illness presents challenges for both short- and long-term management. During critical illness, patients with new-onset AF are clinically evaluated for hemodynamic instability owing to the arrhythmia as well as for potentially reversible arrhythmia triggers. ⋯ Therefore, we suggest increased efforts to improve communication of AF events between inpatient and outpatient providers and to reassess patients who had experienced new-onset AF during critical illness after they transition to the post-ICU setting. We describe various strategies for the assessment and long-term management of patients with new-onset AF during critical illness.