Pulmonary pharmacology & therapeutics
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Pulm Pharmacol Ther · Apr 2015
Randomized Controlled Trial Comparative StudyCompare the efficacy of inhaled budesonide and systemic methylprednisolone on systemic inflammation of AECOPD.
Corticosteroids have been shown to improve the outcome of acute exacerbation of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (AECOPD). However, whether inhaled corticosteroids (IC) alone have similar effects with systemic corticosteroid (SCS) is still unclear. ⋯ Inhaled budesonide and systemic methylprednisolone have the same effects on systemic inflammation of AECOPD. Inhaled corticosteroid alone could instead systemic corticosteroid in AECOPD treatment.
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Pulm Pharmacol Ther · Apr 2015
ReviewOmalizumab for severe allergic asthma in clinical trials and real-life studies: what we know and what we should address.
Randomized clinical trials (RCTs) are the gold standard for the assessment of any therapeutic intervention. Real-life (R-L) studies are needed to verify the provided results beyond the experimental setting. ⋯ Though some similarities between RCTs and R-L studies strengthen omalizumab efficacy and safety outcomes, significant differences concerning study population features, follow-up duration, local adverse events and drop-out rate for treatment inefficacy emerge between the two study categories. Furthermore the comparative analysis between RCTs and R-L studies highlights the need for further research, concerning in particular long-term effects of omalizumab and its impact on asthma comorbidities.
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Pulm Pharmacol Ther · Apr 2015
Randomized Controlled TrialThe impact of harmfulness information on citric acid induced cough and urge-to-cough.
The cough reflex is an automatic protective reflex, which can be modulated by conscious effort or other forms of top-down control. In this experiment, we investigated whether information about harmfulness of a cough-inducing substance would augment cough reflex sensitivity and associated urge-to-cough. ⋯ Our findings show that harmfulness information influences urge-to-cough, corroborating the role of cortical mechanisms in modulating the urge-to-cough and suggesting that cognitive manipulations may contribute to cough treatment.