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Saturday, December 3, 2011

Corticosteroids may ease COPD exacerbations.

MedPage Today (11/30) reports, "Corticosteroids ease acute exacerbations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in the intensive care unit," according to a randomized trial published in the Archives of Internal Medicine. "In critically ill COPD patients on mechanical ventilation, systemic corticosteroids cut the median duration of ventilatory support from four days to three (P=0.04) and tended to reduce intensive care unit (ICU) stays as well (P=0.09). ... Corticosteroid treatment also reduced the need to transition patients from noninvasive to invasive ventilation as a rescue measure (0% versus 37% without corticosteroids, P=0.004)."

Of note: this was one dosing regimen. Steroids may help but or even days of duration.
http://chestjournal.chestpubs.org/content/119/3/726.short

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