In some patients, acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) leads to life-threatening refractory hypoxemia developing. Physicians may consider hypoxemic rescue therapies in an attempt to improve oxygenation in these patients while on conventional mechanical ventilation support. Use of inhaled nitric oxide (iNO) in ARDS is one of the most widely-studied pharmacological interventions over the pa…
Our objective was to assess types, presentation, duration of symptoms and usefulness of rigid bronchoscopy for diagnosis and treatment of bronchial foreign body (FB) in children
The potent and now longstanding evidence of the association between placentationrelated disorders and cardiovascular disease should be translated into clinical practice in order to introduce a preventive approach to future obstetric and cardiovascular diseases. The purpose of this review is to integrate cardiovascular risk/disease and obstetric complications, which are linked by endothelial dy…
Ambroxol is a widely used secretolytic and mucoactive over-the-counter agent primarily used to treat respiratory diseases associated with viscid mucus. Following post-marketing reports of hypersensitivity reactions and severe cutaneous adverse reactions (SCARs) possibly linked to ambroxol, the European Union’s Pharmacovigilance Risk Assessment Committee (PRAC) initiated in April 2014 a review…
Tuberculosis remains the leading cause of death from an infectious disease among adults worldwide, with more than 10 million people becoming newly sick from tuberculosis each year. Advances in diagnosis, including the use of rapid molecular testing and whole-genome sequencing in both sputum and non-sputum samples, could change this situation. Although little has changed in the treatment of d…
Epidemic thunderstorm asthma (ETSA) refers to large-scale acute bronchospasm events associated with thunderstorm. The most serious episode ever recorded occurred in Melbourne, Australia, in November 2016, where more than 3500 patients were treated in hospitals and 10 died. Previous work has been focused primarily on patient presentations to emergency departments. The prevalence of individuals …
Precision medicine is a patient specific approach that integrates all relevant clinical, genetic and biological information in order to optimise the therapeutic benefit relative to the possibility of side effects for each individual. Recent clinical trials have shown that higher blood eosinophil counts are associated with a greater efficacy of inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) in COPD patients
Mycobacterium tuberculosis remains one of the most significant causes of death from an infectious agent. The rapid diagnosis of tuberculosis and detection of rifampin (RIF) resistance are essential for early disease management. The GeneXpert MTB/RIF assay is a novel integrated diagnostic device for the diagnosis of tuberculosis and rapid detection of RIF resistance in clinical specimens.
The Xpert MTB/RIF assay (Xpert) is a rapid test for tuberculosis (TB) and rifampin resistance (RIF-R) suitable for point-of-care testing. However, it has decreased sensitivity in smear-negative sputum, and false identification of RIF-R occasionally occurs. We developed the Xpert MTB/RIF Ultra assay (Ultra) to improve performance. Ultra and Xpert limits of detection (LOD), dynamic ranges, and R…