Category Archives: Critical Care

SOAP-II Brief Summary – Dopamine vs norepinephrine for shock

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Summary of the SOAP-II (De Backer 2010) Trial

Among patients with all types of shock, mortality rates were not different between norepinephrine and dopamine, although norepinephrine was more effective as a vasopressor and was less associated with arrhythmias. Norepinephrine may have a mortality benefit over dopamine in a subset of patients with cardiogenic shock.

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ANZICS Dopamine Brief Summary – Renally-dosing dopamine in early renal dysfunction

ICU Trials by ClinCalc

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Summary of the ANZICS Dopamine (Bellomo 2001) Trial

The use of “renal dose” dopamine did not reduce peak creatinine, the need for renal replacement therapy, ICU length of stay, or mortality.

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Wunderink 2012 Brief Summary – Linezolid vs. vancomycin for MRSA HAP

ICU Trials by ClinCalc

Ready to improve your ICU knowledge? Check out ICU Trials for iPhone and Android, a pocket reference for 70+ landmark critical care trials, including Wunderink 2012.

Summary of the Wunderink 2012 Trial

In a cohort of patients with MRSA pneumonia, linezolid was shown to improve clinical cure rate and cause less nephrotoxicity than vancomycin, but it did not improve 60-day mortality. The findings of this study may have been confounded by unbalanced baseline characteristics.

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Bernard 2002 Brief Summary – Australian hypothermia study for out-of-hospital arrest

ICU Trials by ClinCalc

Ready to improve your ICU knowledge? Check out ICU Trials for iPhone and Android, a pocket reference for 70+ landmark critical care trials, including Bernard 2002.

Summary of the Bernard 2002 Trial

Therapeutic hypothermia in patients with out-of-hospital VF arrest improved the incidence of favorable discharge disposition and a trend towards improved mortality.

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HACA Brief Summary – European hypothermia study for out-of-hospital arrest

ICU Trials by ClinCalc

Ready to improve your ICU knowledge? Check out ICU Trials for iPhone and Android, a pocket reference for 70+ landmark critical care trials, including HACA.

Summary of the HACA Trial

Therapeutic hypothermia improved 6-month neurologic outcome and mortality among patients with out-of-hospital VT/VF cardiac arrest. Note that hypothermia may be associated with certain complications, such as increased risk of bleeding and infection.

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CRASH 2 Brief Summary – Tranexamic acid in trauma patients

ICU Trials by ClinCalc

Ready to improve your ICU knowledge? Check out ICU Trials for iPhone and Android, a pocket reference for 70+ landmark critical care trials, including CRASH 2.

Summary of the CRASH 2 Trial

Tranexamic acid reduced all-cause mortality in a broad population of trauma patients without an increase in vascular occlusion complications.

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Fresenius Kabi: It’s Time to Pull the Plug on Voluven (hydroxyethyl starch 130/0.4)

Voluven (hydroxyethyl starch 130/0.4) was heralded to the hospital community as a cheaper alternative to albumin, but safer than previous hydroxyethyl starch (HES) products that were shown to cause bleeding and renal failure.

Although Voluven is likely “safer” than older HES products, it still is NOT safer than traditional volume repletion with normal saline or albumin.  It was a good run, Voluven, but it’s time to pull the plug.

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