Current medical research and opinion
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Randomized Controlled Trial Multicenter Study
Asthma exacerbations in African Americans treated for 1 year with combination fluticasone propionate and salmeterol or fluticasone propionate alone.
This long-term prospective study was conducted in African Americans with persistent asthma to examine the safety and effectiveness of the combination of the inhaled corticosteroid, fluticasone propionate (FP), and the long-acting beta-agonist, salmeterol, compared with FP alone. ⋯ In this large, prospective study among African Americans with asthma, the addition of salmeterol to FP resulted in a similar low rate of exacerbations and improved other markers of asthma control. Both FSC 100/50 mcg and FP 100 mcg were well-tolerated, and the overall safety-profiles were similar over 1 year of treatment.
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Randomized Controlled Trial Comparative Study
Paper versus electronic rating scales for pain assessment: a prospective, randomised, cross-over validation study with 200 chronic pain patients.
Following the recent introduction of hand-held computers to be used by patients instead of conventional pencil-and-paper questionnaires, a validation study under 'real-life' conditions was conducted, in order to compare these two clinical instruments when used by chronic pain patients to describe their pain using visual and numerical rating scales. ⋯ Under conditions of routine clinical practice, the hand-held computer questionnaire can give results equivalent to those obtained with the conventional paper questionnaire.