American journal of respiratory and critical care medicine
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Am. J. Respir. Crit. Care Med. · Apr 2014
Timing of Tuberculosis Transmission and the Impact of Household Contact Tracing: An Agent-Based Simulation Model.
Household contact tracing has recently been endorsed for global tuberculosis (TB) control, but its potential population-level impact remains uncertain. ⋯ Household contact tracing is unlikely to transform TB epidemiology in isolation but has the potential, especially with provision of preventive therapy, to augment a comprehensive package of interventions that could substantially reduce the population-level burden of TB.
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Am. J. Respir. Crit. Care Med. · Apr 2014
Conditions Associated with the Cystic Fibrosis Defect Promote Chronic Pseudomonas aeruginosa Infection.
Progress has been made in understanding how the cystic fibrosis (CF) basic defect produces lung infection susceptibility. However, it remains unclear why CF exclusively leads to chronic infections that are noninvasive and highly resistant to eradication. Although biofilm formation has been suggested as a mechanism, recent work raises questions about the role of biofilms in CF. ⋯ Our findings suggest that conditions associated with several CF pathogenesis hypotheses could cause the noninvasive and resistant infection phenotype, independently of the bacterial functions needed for biofilm formation.
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Am. J. Respir. Crit. Care Med. · Apr 2014
All-cause Mortality Rate in Patients with Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis: Implications for the Design and Execution of Clinical Trials.
FVC has emerged as a standard primary endpoint in clinical trials evaluating novel therapies for patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). However, it has recently been proposed that all-cause mortality or a composite comprised of all-cause mortality and all-cause nonelective hospitalization be adopted as the standard primary endpoint for IPF clinical trials. ⋯ The all-cause mortality rate is relatively low in patients with IPF with mild to moderate impairment in lung function. Accordingly, the necessary size, duration, and cost of all-cause mortality trials in this population are substantial and likely prohibitive.