M. Alexander Otto

HIV shortens life expectancy 9 years, healthy life expectancy 16 years

MAUI, HAWAII – “Evidence of a stricture is of paramount importance.”

ATLANTA – A study presented at the ACR annual meeting and previous work from others builds a case for methotrexate.

BALTIMORE – “If you are not convinced to do early treatment,” at least “do surveillance with EEG. You will diagnose epilepsy earlier, and treat earlier, and children will do much better.”

ATLANTA – “If you only have a second to examine a child or you can’t get them to sit still, just go straight for the hands, and have a low threshold for imaging,” Dr. Charlene Foley said.

ATLANTA – Women taking the drug experienced more than a 50% drop in the rate of congenital heart block in comparison to the historical rate.

Inadequate allopurinol dosing has been the bête noire of rheumatology for years.

Volume directly tied to mitral valve procedure success

ST. LOUIS – Patients don’t have to be immunosuppressed.

Brain abscess with lung infection? Think Nocardia

NEW ORLEANS – The study helps inform the use of a cuff that’s too big or too small when the correct sized cuff is unavailable.

SAN FRANCISCO – The study was unusual among other DPP-4 trials in that almost 60% of the patients were older than 65, and 62.3% had impaired renal function.

SAN FRANCISCO – Benzos are “wonderful” for geriatric anxiety and anxiety-related insomnia, said Dr. Carl Salzman of Harvard Medical School.

ECT maybe more durable than ketamine as a treatment.

SAN FRANCISCO – Prevalence was about 12% among heavy users, meaning three or more times a week.

SAN FRANCISCO – A few months of a medically supervised liquid diet; durable remission at 2 years.

SAN FRANCISCO – “This is a marvelous study that we should have done,” said Dr. Jaskaran Singh, clinical leader of the esketamine program at Janssen.

SAN FRANCISCO – “These are not things that will be taught to you in your residency.”

SAN FRANCISCO – Some hospitals cited concerns about staff injuries from moving – or trying to calm – a large patient.

SAN FRANCISCO – “Low-attenuation noncalcified plaques don’t [regress] over time in lupus, and they are the ones that lead to cardiovascular events,” said Dr. George Stojan.