Bmc Med
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The most prescribed medications in the world are statins, lipid modifiers that have been available for over 25 years and amongst the most investigated of all drug classes. With over a million patient years of trial data and publications in the most prestigious medical journals, it is remarkable that quite so much debate remains as to their place in healthcare. ⋯ On the other side, there have been billions of dollars spent on generating their evidence base followed by promotion which has returned that investment many times over in profits, and a powerful scientific lobby that argue they are wonder drugs and that continued nihilism on their value risks patient lives. So who is right?
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Our previous meta-analysis found that South Asians and Blacks in the UK were at a substantially increased risk of hospital admission from asthma. These estimates were, however, derived from pooling data from a limited number of now dated studies, confined to only three very broad ethnic groups (i.e. Whites, South Asians and Blacks) and failed to take account of possible sex-related differences in outcomes within these ethnic groups. We undertook the first study investigating ethnic variations in asthma outcomes across an entire population. ⋯ There are very substantial ethnic variations in hospital admission/deaths from asthma in Scotland, with Pakistanis having the worst and Chinese having the best outcomes. Cultural factors, including self-management and health seeking behaviours, and variations in the quality of primary care provision are the most likely explanations for these differences and these now need to be formally investigated.
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Prior to the 2014-2015 Ebola outbreak, infection prevention and control (IPC) activities in Liberian healthcare facilities were basic. There was no national IPC guidance, nor dedicated staff at any level of government or healthcare facility (HCF) to ensure the implementation of best practices. Efforts to improve IPC early in the outbreak were ad hoc and messaging was inconsistent. ⋯ A steering group of the Task Force, including representatives of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), supported MoH leadership in implementing standardized messaging and IPC training for the health workforce. This structure, and the activities implemented under this structure, played a crucial role in the implementation of IPC practices and successful containment of the outbreak. Moving forward, a nationwide culture of IPC needs to be maintained through this governance structure in Liberia's health system to prevent and respond to future outbreaks.
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In the last years, thanks to the improvement in the prognosis of cancer patients, a growing attention has been given to the fertility issues. International guidelines on fertility preservation in cancer patients recommend that physicians discuss, as early as possible, with all patients of reproductive age their risk of infertility from the disease and/or treatment and their interest in having children after cancer, and help with informed fertility preservation decisions. As recommended by the American Society of Clinical Oncology and the European Society for Medical Oncology, sperm cryopreservation and embryo/oocyte cryopreservation are standard strategies for fertility preservations in male and female patients, respectively; other strategies (e.g. pharmacological protection of the gonads and gonadal tissue cryopreservation) are considered experimental techniques. ⋯ On the basis of the data presented, as well as the expertise of the invited speakers, a total of ten recommendations were discussed and prepared with the aim to help physicians in counseling their young patients interested in fertility preservation. Although there is a great interest in this field, due to the lack of large prospective cohort studies and randomized trials on these topics, the level of evidence is not higher than 3 for most of the recommendations highlighting the need of further research efforts in many areas of this field. The participation to the ongoing registries and prospective studies is crucial to acquire more robust information in order to provide evidence-based recommendations.