Proper Search

Friday, September 23, 2011

Clinic Sept 23, 2011

The handout for solitary pulmonary nodule (password required) is here.

A recent review (2008) on the evaluation of said nodules is here:
http://pats.atsjournals.org/cgi/content/full/5/9/900

This algorithm is advocated by the guidelines:


As discussed, the role of CT-PET is still being defined, particulary for nodules less than 8mm but it may be a useful technique in specific circumstances when biopsy or resection would be difficult or have significant morbidity. 

1) We then discussed radiation risk from CT scans -- review here
http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/357/22/2277

Interesting editorial here (written by a mentor and a classmate from my time in Toronto):
http://jama.ama-assn.org/content/304/19/2170.full

2) We had a patient with significant by asymptomatic hypothyroidism with a profoundly elevated TSH.  He also had mild renal failure, normocytic anemia, and mild hepatitis all of which could be due to the hypothroidism.


This older blog post describes the approach to myxedema coma.

We discussed the importance of ruling out other endocrinopathies (in particular Addison's disease) and one astute resident mentioned the impotance of excluding celiac disease.

Monday, September 19, 2011

Dabigatran and bleeding

From Annals Int Med -- the bleeding reduction for dabigatran seems to be for younger and not older patients (with all the caveats of subgroup comparisons).

Question -- why wasn't this data included in the original publication?

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

From the clinic -- September 14, 2011

Some related articles to our discussion(s):

A) Late onset CVID (common variable immunodeficiency)
https://webvpn.mcgill.ca/http/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19807277

(and late onset congenital immunodeficiencies in general)
https://webvpn.mcgill.ca/http/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20581672

B) On the ever challenging question of use of beta-blockers in COPD
https://webvpn.mcgill.ca/http/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21596228

C) Conn's Syndrome
Diagnosis and Treatment:
https://webvpn.mcgill.ca/http/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21565669

What happens if you remove a functional adenoma?
https://webvpn.mcgill.ca/http/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21882028

What do you do when you find an "incidentaloma" of the adrenal?
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMcp065470

D) The (possible) association between leukotriene receptor agonist therapy and Churg-Strauss
https://webvpn.mcgill.ca/http/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20147592