Image: Airwaycam Endotracheal intubation is a routine but high-stakes maneuver, performed uneventfully thousands of times daily throughout the developed world. In the U.S., elective (routine) intubation is almost exclusively the domain of anesthesiologists, who become masters of the technique through thousands of iterations throughout training and their careers. The vast majority of these intubations take [… read more]
Subglottic suctioning can prevent ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP), but much of the research showing its benefits was performed prior to wide adoption of the so-called “VAP bundle,” widely believed to reduce VAP incidence. This led some to question any additive benefits of subglottic suctioning. Authors of a new randomized trial found that subglottic suctioning also reduced ventilator-associated pneumonia incidence in a [… read more]
Image: Wikipedia Acute pancreatitis is a common and usually self-limited illness resolving after a few days of rest and not eating. A minority of people develop severe pancreatitis with necrosis, which can transform pancreatitis into an ordeal lasting weeks or months, characterized by multi-organ failure, infections, and a >15% mortality rate. Those infections are believed to be caused by [… read more]
The smoking cessation drug varenicline (Chantix) works by weakly activating and also blocking nicotine receptors in the brain, simultaneously. This neat trick has the dual effects of reducing tobacco cravings while also blunting the “high” from smoking. That combination has made Chantix the most successful smoking-cessation therapy on the market, but it costs about $500 for [… read more]
Here are some of the biggest stories and most important published research findings in critical care and respiratory medicine for 2014. Enjoy, and subscribe to the PulmCCM weekly email newsletter to stay up to date in pulmonary and critical care. Early goal directed therapy does not improve outcomes in septic shock (ProCESS) Are traditional protocols [… read more]
In the early 1990s, the clot-busting drug alteplase (intravenous recombinant tissue plasminogen activator or rTPA) revolutionized stroke treatment when it was shown to significantly increase the chances of a good outcome after ischemic stroke when given in the first 4.5 hours since symptom onset. But alteplase is not a miracle drug. In a meta-analysis of 9 randomized trials, rTPA improved [… read more]
Put a CT scanner in every U.S. emergency department, add the non-specific signs and symptoms of pulmonary embolism, stir in its potential lethality and morbidity, and line up a few thousand lawyers on the sidelines ready to capitalize on any missed diagnoses, and it’s no wonder that the use of CT-angiograms to rule out pulmonary embolism has risen 11-fold [… read more]
Ignoring its advisory panel, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) announced that annual low-dose CT lung cancer screening for high-risk individuals will be covered by Medicare. However, CMS applied restrictions that will limit access to screening, avoiding the chaotic marketplace free-for-all that would have resulted from an unrestricted approval. Medicare will pay for one lung cancer [… read more]
In Defense of the Central Venous Pressure Jon-Emile S. Kenny M.D. In the waning days of my fellowship I received a hemoptysis consult in the cardiac care unit. Sifting through CT scans, I overheard two house-officers giving sign-out for the evening. When reviewing the clinical data, one of the residents referred to the central venous pressure [… read more]
2014 has been a rough year for advocates of sepsis protocols. First, the long-awaited ProCESS trial did not show any benefit from use of the original early goal-directed therapy (EGDT) protocol used in the single-center 2001 trial by Rivers et al that, despite criticism, became the standard of care for the following decade. Patients cared for in the 2 non-EGDT arms [… read more]
Olodaterol People with severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) often have persistent dyspnea or exacerbations despite the use of a single controller inhaler. (Controller inhalers for COPD most often include combination inhaled corticosteroid/long-acting beta agonists like Advair, Dulera and Symbicort [ICS/LABAs] and the long-acting anticholinergic agent Spiriva/tiotropium). These patients often take both a combination ICS/LABA and Spiriva, so-called [… read more]
The U.S. FDA approved the first two drugs proven to slow progression of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF): pirfenidone (Esbriet by Roche, which bought Intermune) and nintedanib (Ofev by Boehringer Ingelheim) on Wednesday October 15. Both drugs will offer new hope for patients, and new pain to the insurance companies and the government who pay for them. Pirfenidone [… read more]
Stroke Volume Variation and the Concept of Dose-Response Jon-Emile S. Kenny M.D. Awareness of the undulating pattern of an arterial line tracing is high amongst health professionals in the intensive care unit; certainly this is an aftereffect of a cacophony of studies and reviews pertaining to pulse pressure variation and fluid responsiveness in the operating [… read more]
Feeding patients enterally (nasogastric or nasojejunal tube feedings) has been the standard of care for critically ill patients, based on weak evidence that it reduces infection rates; hence the adage “feed the gut, if you can.” That last caveat is included because so many critically ill patients have gastric motility impairment (with inability to achieve [… read more]
Blood transfusions have been a central component of protocols for care of severe sepsis and septic shock, ever since the single-center 2001 Rivers trial included them in its interventions. Any benefit (or harm) caused by red cell transfusion independently was unknowable, and so the therapy became standard care as part of the so-called sepsis bundle. The Surviving [… read more]
Update: As astute commenters have mentioned below, and as I stated in our post on the ProCESS trial, protocols of some kind could still have a place in the care of sepsis if they ensure more rapid recognition and thorough treatment. Accordingly, I changed the headline to clarify that it’s only traditional sepsis protocols to which I refer, not the [… read more]
I am proud to announce the publication of the first issue of PulmCCM Journal, a new online peer-reviewed journal in respiratory and critical care medicine. Please click through to read edition 1, volume 1, issue 1 online now: Starting a journal as an extension of a blog designed to cope with an overabundance of journals may [… read more]
All the best in the pulmonary and critical care medicine literature from our ongoing journal survey. Browse all the PulmCCM Roundups to stay up to date. Thrombolytics for Pulmonary Embolism: New Metaanalysis Most patients with massive pulmonary embolism (PE with shock) should receive thrombolytics, but it’s unclear from randomized trial data which patients with submassive pulmonary embolism [… read more]
The American College of Chest Physicians (unaffiliated with PulmCCM) published its new consensus guidelines in August 2014 for the drug treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH). They’re free to view on the Chest website, and well worth a look. Remember that pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) is but one small subset (“Group 1”) of the much larger [… read more]
ICU Physiology in 1,000 Words “The Hemodynamics of Prone” by Jon-Emile S. Kenny MD A physiological maelstrom has recently swirled about the hemodynamic effects of the prone position in severe ARDS [1-5]; but how exactly does this maneuver alter the cardiovascular system? A good approach to this problem is a Guytonian one whereby we consider [… read more]
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