Preventing readmissions of COPD patients: more prospective studies are needed

Prospective, population based studies of cavernous malformations are needed.

Echographic evaluation of ICU patients with tissue Doppler imaging: more studies and more consensus are still needed

many intensive care units (ICUs), cardiac transthoracic echocardio graphy (TTE) has replaced invasive monitoring in routine evaluation of acutely ill patients. Since the mid '80s, there have been many studies of ICU patients, most of whom were receiving mechanical ventilation (MV). With the emergence of new TTE modalities such as tissue Doppler imaging (TDI) and strain rate or three-dimensional...

[Generalists are needed more than ever].

15 If today you want to keep up with basic and clin‐ ical research, you need to concentrate on a very small field and reach tremendous depths in this very field. And, actually, life is too short to also accumulate the knowledge necessary to do mean‐ ingful scientific work even on closely related top‐ ics. Hence, specialization is inevitable not only in research; it was a prerequisite for the de...

Are haemophiliacs protected against cancer development? Prospective controlled studies are needed

We read with interest the recent article by Brüggemann and colleagues [1]. In a murine (B16F10 murine melanoma cell line) experimental study, the authors have demonstrated that congenital prothrombotic disorders, like factor V Leiden, ease the metastatic capacity of cancer, whereas congenital bleeding tendencies, like haemophilia A, impede metastasis. These results are in agreement with those p...

Home overnight pulse oximetry in patients with COPD: more than one recording may be needed.

STUDY OBJECTIVES Home overnight pulse oximetry (OPO) is used to assess nocturnal desaturation in patients with COPD, but the current practice of relying on one recording has not been studied. We assessed the variability of nocturnal desaturation in patients with COPD between nights, as measured by home OPO. DESIGN Study subjects attended for clinical evaluation, spirometry, and arterial blood...