Publications by authors named "Alba La Sala"

To date, the virtual multidisciplinary tumor boards (vMTBs) are increasingly used to achieve high-quality treatment recommendations across health-care regions, which expands and develops the local MTB team to a regional or national expert network. This review describes the process of lung cancer-specific MTBs and the transition process from face-to-face tumor boards to virtual ones. The review also focuses on the project organization's description, advantages, and disadvantages.

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Article Synopsis
  • A study was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness and cost of Endo-Bronchial Valves in treating persistent air-leaks (PALs) in patients with severe and persistent issues.
  • Out of 74 patients, 91% received valve treatment, resulting in an 88% complete resolution of air-leaks and significant reductions in air-leak duration, chest tube removal time, and hospital stays.
  • Despite the procedure not significantly changing overall health costs, the potential for reduced hospitalization costs due to quicker recovery could justify the expense of the valve treatment.
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There is limited information on the efficacy and safety of bronchial thermoplasty (BT) in . We evaluated the outcomes of the randomized clinical trials for BT in severe asthmatics, in whom the exclusion criteria were not strictly controlled. A case series of seven asthmatics (M/F: 4/3; age: 54.

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In patients with mild chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), the effect of deep inspirations (DIs) to reverse methacholine-induced bronchoconstriction is largely attenuated. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that the effectiveness of DI is reduced with increasing disease severity and that this is associated with a reduction in the ability of DI to distend the airways. Fifteen subjects [Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD) stage I-II: n = 7; GOLD stage III-IV: n = 8] underwent methacholine bronchoprovocation in the absence of DI, followed by DI.

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COPD represents one of the leading causes of mortality in the general population. This study aimed at evaluating the relationship between airway hyperresponsiveness (AHR) and COPD and its relevance for clinical practice. We performed a MEDLINE search that yielded a total of 1919 articles.

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