PneumonPub Date : 2022-03-09DOI: 10.18332/pne/146744
N. Siafakas, Nikolaos K. Koulouris
{"title":"Farewell to Joseph Milic-Emili","authors":"N. Siafakas, Nikolaos K. Koulouris","doi":"10.18332/pne/146744","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18332/pne/146744","url":null,"abstract":"Joseph Milic-Emili Joseph Milic-Emili was born in 1931 in the village of Sezana, then part of Italy, but now in Slovenia. After obtaining his medical degree from the University of Milan in 1955, he was appointed Assistant Professor in the Department of Physiology in that institution, where he carried out research on exercise physiology with Rodolfo Margaria. He was enticed to move to the University of Liège in 1958 by the Belgian physiologist Jean-Marie Petit, with whom he developed methods to measure pleural pressure with the esophageal balloon catheter as well as the electrical activity of the diaphragm using esophageal electrodes, techniques still applied in patients to this day. In 1960 Milic-Emili moved to Boston to work at the Harvard School of Public Health. Then in 1963, at the invitation of David Bates, Milic-Emili moved to McGill University, where he spent the remainder of his career. Milic-Emili was Chairman of the Department of Physiology at McGill between 1973 and 1978, prior to becoming Director of the Meakins-Christie Labs in 1979. He was appointed Professor Emeritus in the Departments of Physiology and Medicine at McGill in 1998. Throughout his career he received many honors and distinctions. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in 1980 and was conferred the Order of Canada in 1990. He was granted the degree of Doctor Honoris Causa by the Université Catholique de Louvain (1987), the University of Kunming (1988), Université de Montpellier (1994), and the University of Ljubljana (1999).","PeriodicalId":42353,"journal":{"name":"Pneumon","volume":"27 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-03-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"82618871","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
PneumonPub Date : 2022-02-21DOI: 10.18332/pne/145338
Petros Pouliopoulos, K. Manika, E. Faniadou, Stavros Galanis, K. Vasileiou, M. Sionidou, A. Avgerinos, I. Kioumis
{"title":"Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in a patient with cystic fibrosis and liver disease (cirrhosis)","authors":"Petros Pouliopoulos, K. Manika, E. Faniadou, Stavros Galanis, K. Vasileiou, M. Sionidou, A. Avgerinos, I. Kioumis","doi":"10.18332/pne/145338","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18332/pne/145338","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42353,"journal":{"name":"Pneumon","volume":"63 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-02-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"88052111","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
PneumonPub Date : 2022-01-31DOI: 10.18332/pne/144108
S. Braga, João Costa, Gonçalo Santos
{"title":"Sphenoid bone metastasis in lung cancer: An unusual finding","authors":"S. Braga, João Costa, Gonçalo Santos","doi":"10.18332/pne/144108","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18332/pne/144108","url":null,"abstract":"1 A 68-year-old man with a recent diagnosis of small cell lung carcinoma, presented for a routine evaluation at our local lung cancer department, aiming to start treatment with carboplatin and etoposide. During the evaluation he seemed disoriented and complained of a headache. On physical examination only spatiotemporal disorientation stood out on the neurologic examination, with no other changes to report. Blood tests revealed hyponatremia, and elevated creatinine, alkaline phosphatase, gamma-GT, bilirubin, C reactive protein and procalcitonin. He was then admitted and treated for possible urinary infection, later confirmed by positive urine and blood cultures for Escherichia coli. Considering maintained symptoms, he was further investigated with a head CT scan with contrast to rule out brain metastases and it end up revealing a sphenoidal osteolytic lesion measuring 20×20×14 mm (Figure 1A), in addition to other smaller cranial bone metastases. Head MRI was also requested to allow a better characterization, showing an osteolytic lesion centered on the right paramedian region of the basisphenoid, with pronounced hyperintensity on T2-FLAIR images (Figure 1B), and homogeneous signal enhancement after contrast administration (Figures 1C and 1D). The case presented poses an unusual finding. Although imaging study was performed to clarify the presence of brain metastases, the sphenoid metastasis","PeriodicalId":42353,"journal":{"name":"Pneumon","volume":"43 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-01-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74672823","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
PneumonPub Date : 2021-12-10DOI: 10.18332/pne/144496
K. Kostikas
{"title":"Real-life effectiveness of ICS/LABA inhalers in\u0000asthma: The evidence generated and future needs for\u0000optimal patient management","authors":"K. Kostikas","doi":"10.18332/pne/144496","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18332/pne/144496","url":null,"abstract":"The fixed-dose combinations (FDC) of inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) with longacting β2-agonists (LABA) represent one of the most widely used controller options for the management of patients with asthma, worldwide. Recently, the Global Initiative for Asthma (GINA) reports recommended the use of ICScontaining regimens in all the steps of asthma management, suggesting that the preferred reliever option would be combinations of ICS/formoterol, setting consequently these inhalers as the preferred controller option for such patients1. In the quest of the selection of the appropriate inhaled medication for our patients with asthma, a broad choice of inhalers is currently available. The treating physician needs to take into consideration several characteristics of the inhalation device, involving both the substances included but also the characteristics of the device that will be most appropriate for the individual patient, in order to ensure the acceptability of the device by the patient that will consequently lead to better adherence to the inhaled treatment and better disease outcomes2. The ‘ideal’ inhaler should carry several properties, including being userand environmental-friendly (e.g. being breath-actuated, being multi-dose and portable yet robust, avoiding harmful additives, e.g. propellants), allowing for control of the appropriate dosing by providing feedback and dose receipt confirmation, providing the dosing independently of environmental conditions and inspiratory flow rate, and achieving high lung deposition with high respirable fine particle fraction3. In the journey of the management of patients with airways disease, the treating physicians should be familiar with the properties of the inhalation devices that they prescribe, choose the appropriate device based on the characteristics of each individual patient, involve actively the patients in the device and treatment selection, evaluate the patients’ inhalation technique and train them appropriately at each visit, and re-evaluate the need for a different device whenever they identify a potential gap in the use of the previous one, but switch to a new device only with the patients’ involvement and appropriate education4. The dry powder inhaler (DPI) combination of budesonide and formoterol in the Elpenhaler® has been shown to be bioequivalent in terms of lung deposition to the same formulation delivered by the Turbuhaler® device in a crossover pharmacokinetic study in 100 patients with asthma5. Moreover, there is evidence of high satisfaction and acceptability of the Elpenhaler® in patients with asthma and COPD using the Feeling of Satisfaction with Inhaler (FSI-10) questionnaire that was comparable or better to other DPI devices6,7, whereas it also presented lower rates of critical errors that affect drug delivery to the lungs when compared with the Diskus® and Turbuhaler® devices in a prospective study of 755 patients with asthma and COPD8. In this issue of Pneumon, Bakakos et al.9 pro","PeriodicalId":42353,"journal":{"name":"Pneumon","volume":"29 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-12-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"82586171","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}