We congratulate the authors for their study, which is one piece of the puzzle of a persistent clinical dilemma: when and how do we have to search for a pulmonary embolism (PE) in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) patients? One of their conclusions is that ‘‘the Wells criteria appear to be a significantly better tool [than the Geneva score] for exploring COPD patients for PE’’. This p...

Background Patients presenting with suspected deep vein thrombosis (DVT) are common in the emergency department. Evidence based strategies for the diagnostic evaluation of these patients exists. The diagnosis is based on three criteria: a clinical pre-test probability score (Wells score), D-dimer testing, and ultrasound examination of the deep veins. The aim of our study was to evaluate the adh...

INTRODUCTION Prompt diagnosis and treatment of pulmonary embolism (PE) can help reduce its associated morbidity and mortality. Computed tomography chest angiography (CTA) scanning is the most widely used diagnostic modality. In noncancer patients, only 10% of such studies are positive for PE. Clinical variables, individual or in combination, that can predict test positivity are highly needed. ...

Assays that assess cellular mediated immune responses performed under Good Clinical Laboratory Practice (GCLP) guidelines are required to provide specific and reproducible results. Defined validation procedures are required to establish the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP), include pass and fail criteria, as well as implement positivity criteria. However, little to no guidance is provided on ...

One of the most important resources for drinking water is groundwater. Recently, the quality of groundwater has been endangered due to several reasons, including human activities, vast agricultural activities, and the discharge of industrial wastewater containing nitrogen (N) and heavy metals. For this study we investigated the values of NO3, NO2, and some heavy metals and analyzed the groundwa...