Procedure volume is one determinant of centre effect in mechanically ventilated patients.

Survival rates vary significantly between intensive care units, most notably in patients requiring mechanical ventilation (MV). The present study sought to estimate the effect of hospital MV volume on hospital mortality. We included 179,197 consecutive patients who received mechanical ventilation in 294 hospitals.

Pre-emption dimensional study aiming to obtain significant statistical results for the variation of serum cortisol during ovarian stimulation.

Unlabelled: Ovarian stimulation has an important place in the contemporary impressive development of infertility treatment. There are few and not concordant data concerning its influence on cortisol serum levels.

Aim: The present study aimed at finding the necessary number of determinations in order to statistically assess the variation of cortisol during and caused by the ovarian stimulation.

The variation of serum cortisol during ovarian stimulation for in vitro fertilization.

Aim: As there is no consensus concerning the variation of serum cortisol level during in vitro fertilization (IVF), we studied it prospectively by frequent evaluation throughout the course of an IVF cycle and compared the value, as control, of cortisol concentration obtained in the previous month (M-1) with the concentration obtained on the first day (D1) of ovarian stimulation.

Methods: In 23 IVF cycles using gonadotropin-releasing hormone agonist/human menopausal gonadotropins (hMG)/human chorionic gonadotropin, cortisol and estradiol were measured at M-1, D1, day 14 (D14, before beginning hMG), day 16 (D16), day 19 (D19), day 22 (D22), day 24 (D24), the day before (T-1) and the day after triggering ovulation (T+1), the day of oocyte retrieval (OR), 15 days after embryo transfer (ET+15) and the next month (M2). Statistical analysis used tests of linear tendency, the Pearson chi(2) test, analysis of variance, Student's t test and Spearman correlation.

[ICU performance: results of a French study involving 80,000 ICU stays].

Objective: The Standard Mortality Ratio (SMR), comparing the observed in-hospital mortality to the predicted, may measure the intensive care units (ICU) performance.

Study Design: Multicentric retrospective national study.

Methods: A probability model using a severity score such SAPS II calculated the predicted mortality rate.

Mortality prediction using SAPS II: an update for French intensive care units.

Introduction: The standardized mortality ratio (SMR) is commonly used for benchmarking intensive care units (ICUs). Available mortality prediction models are outdated and must be adapted to current populations of interest. The objective of this study was to improve the Simplified Acute Physiology Score (SAPS) II for mortality prediction in ICUs, thereby improving SMR estimates.