Abstracts

Advances in technology in recent years increased the long-term survival rate of patients with chronic respiratory failure. As a result, the number of patients receiving long-term home mechanical ventilation (LTHV) support is increasing worldwide.1 The most important step in the management of patients with home mechanical ventilation (HMV) is to ensure adequate oxygenation and ventilation. Successful care at home requires the presence of trained caregivers and accessibility to medical devices and a care team.

Pulmonary sequelae after severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection range from limited abnormalities to major interstitial lung diseases (ILD). Bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) and cryobiopsy findings, integrated with the clinical and radiological scenario, may help clinicians to correctly manage patients and aid researchers in better understanding the features and pathogenic mechanisms of post-COVID-19 fibrosis.

Histology is a key element for the multidisciplinary diagnosis of fibrotic diffuse parenchymal lung diseases (f-DPLD) when the clinical–radiological setting of f-DPLD with high-resolution CT features diagnostic of usual interstitial pneumonia (UIP) are not present.

Exposure to pollen has been associated with an increased risk of respiratory symptoms in both allergic and nonallergic individuals. However, the association of pollen exposure with respiratory symptoms during infancy, a particularly vulnerable period for lung development, remains unclear.

Comprehending the rate at which ischaemic myocardium succumbs to necrosis following an abrupt occlusion of a coronary artery is crucial to understand the efficacy and benefits behind the time dependency in ST-elevated myocardial infarction (STEMI) management. Over decades, efforts to shave off life-saving minutes from STEMI care centred on reducing door-to-needle and door-to-balloon times.

Contemporary data suggest endurance athletes are at an increased risk of developing atrial fibrillation (AF) when compared with the general population. Cardioembolic events such as stroke are a well-established complication of untreated AF.

Staging cardiac damage in patients undergoing transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) has been proposed as a prognostic tool. Other authors have shown that these staging systems are related with mortality. The aim of this study was to perform an external validation of the predictive capacity of the staging system proposed by Généreux et al.

Globally, cardiovascular diseases remain the leading cause of death, taking an estimated 17.9 million lives each year. It is projected that the global burden of cardiovascular diseases will continue to rise.