Publications by authors named "Criner G"

Background: Pulmonary fibrosis is a severe, progressive form of interstitial lung disease associated with increased morbidity and mortality. Pulmonary hypertension often accompanies severe pulmonary fibrosis and is also associated with worse outcomes. Antifibrotic therapy and pulmonary vasodilator therapy have demonstrated clinical benefits in pulmonary fibrosis and pulmonary hypertension, respectively.

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Summary● This is a plain language summary of two articles originally published in and . These articles presented the results of GALATHEA and TERRANOVA, two clinical studies that took place across 41 countries. ○ GALATHEA and TERRANOVA measured how patients' COPD changed from before their first (10, 30, or 100 mg) injection, to after 56 weeks of treatment.

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  • Chronic bronchitis (CB) is defined as a persistent cough with sputum for at least three months each year for two consecutive years and is often linked to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).
  • A study using data from over 104 million patients identified groups with CB only, COPD only, and both conditions, finding that most CB patients were diagnosed before COPD.
  • The study revealed that the group with both CB and COPD had the highest healthcare resource utilization (HCRU) and a greater prevalence of common comorbidities, emphasizing the need for better management of CB to prevent its progression to COPD.
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Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a heterogeneous condition of the lungs, characterized by chronic respiratory symptoms, primarily dyspnea, cough, and sputum production, due to airway and/or alveoli abnormalities that cause persistent, and often progressive, airflow obstruction. Although the underlying mechanisms responsible for COPD remain poorly understood, over the last several decades, clinical phenotypes and endotypes have been suggested. These include frequent exacerbator and eosinophilic groups that guide tailored therapies for patients with that clinical expression.

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Background: Pulmonary hypertension (PH) confers increased mortality in patients with chronic lung disease, yet there remains a lack of validated risk assessment tools to prognosticate these patients. We aimed to create a risk assessment tool to stratify patients with chronic lung disease and PH by risk of one-year mortality from time of PH diagnosis.

Methods: This was a retrospective cohort study of patients with chronic lung disease and PH.

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Homeostatic imbalance and lung function decline are central physiological characteristics of aging and susceptibility to respiratory diseases. Senescence contributes to tissue damage and alveolar epithelial cell injury and decreases reparative capacity. Alveolar type II (ATII) cells have stem cell potential and self-renew to regenerate the alveoli after damage.

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Background: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) are debilitating diseases associated with divergent histopathological changes in the lungs. At present, due to cost and technical limitations, profiling cell types is not practical in large epidemiology cohorts (n > 1000). Here, we used computational deconvolution to identify cell types in COPD and IPF lungs whose abundances and cell type-specific gene expression are associated with disease diagnosis and severity.

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The Clinical Practice Standards Committee of the American Association for Thoracic Surgery assembled an expert panel and conducted a systematic review of the literature detailing studies directly comparing treatment options for high-risk patients with stage I non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). A systematic search was performed to identify publications comparing outcomes following image-guided thermal ablation (IGTA), stereotactic ablative radiotherapy (SABR; also called stereotactic body radiation therapy [SBRT] and stereotactic radiosurgery [SRS]), and sublobar resection-the main treatment options applicable to high-risk patients with stage I NSCLC. There were no publications detailing completed randomized controlled trials comparing these treatment options.

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Stereotactic ablative radiotherapy (SABR) has emerged as an alternative, non-surgical treatment for high-risk patients with stage I non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with increased use over time. The American Association for Thoracic Surgery (AATS) Clinical Practice Standards Committee (CPSC) assembled an expert panel and conducted a systematic review of the literature evaluating the results of SABR, which is also referred to as stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) or stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS), prior to developing treatment recommendations for high-risk patients with stage I NSCLC based on expert consensus. Publications detailing the findings of 16 prospective studies of SABR and 14 retrospective studies of SABR for the management of early-stage lung cancer in 54,697 patients were identified by systematic review of the literature with further review by members of our expert panel.

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Sublobar resection offers a parenchymal-sparing surgical alternative to lobectomy and includes wedge resection and segmentectomy. Sublobar resection has been historically utilized in high-risk patients with compromised lung function; however, the technique is becoming more prevalent for normal-risk patients with peripheral stage IA non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) <2 cm. In this article, we summarize the technique of sublobar resection, the importance of surgical margins and lymph node sampling, patient selection, perioperative complications, outcomes, and the impact of sublobar resection on the quality of life.

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Article Synopsis
  • * An expert panel from the American Association for Thoracic Surgery reviewed existing literature and reached a consensus on treatment modalities, which include sublobar resection, image-guided thermal ablation (IGTA), and stereotactic ablative radiotherapy (SABR).
  • * The conclusions highlight that surgical approaches are often preferred when safe, but SABR and IGTA can be suitable alternatives; multidisciplinary evaluations and patient preferences play crucial roles in treatment decisions.
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A significant proportion of patients with stage I non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) are considered at high risk for complications or mortality after lobectomy. The American Association for Thoracic Surgery (AATS) previously published an expert consensus document detailing important considerations in determining who is at high risk. The current objective was to evaluate treatment options and important factors to consider during treatment selection for these high-risk patients.

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Image-guided thermal ablation (IGTA) applied to pulmonary pathology is an alternative to surgery in high-risk patients with stage I non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Its application to lung neoplasm was first introduced in 2001 and has been implemented to treat metastatic disease to the lung or in select medically inoperable patients with peripheral stage I NSCLC. IGTA may also be an alternative to treat stage I NSCLC in non-operable patients with interstitial lung disease in whom a radiation modality is deemed too high risk.

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The Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD) report states that the diagnosis of COPD should be considered in individuals with chronic respiratory symptoms and/or exposure to risk factors. Forced spirometry demonstrating airflow obstruction after bronchodilation is required to confirm the diagnosis using a threshold of forced expiratory volume in 1 s (FEV)/forced vital capacity (FVC) ratio <0.7.

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Among tobacco-exposed persons with preserved spirometry (TEPS), we previously demonstrated that different lung volume indices, specifically elevated total lung capacity (TLC) versus elevated ratio of functional residual capacity-to-TLC (FRC/TLC), identify different lung disease characteristics in the COPDGene cohort. Determine differential disease characteristics and trajectories associated with the lung volume indices among TEPS in the SPIROMICS cohort. We categorized TEPS (n=814) by tertiles (low, intermediate, high) of TLC or residual volume-to-TLC (RV/TLC) derived from baseline CT images, and then examined clinical and spirometric disease trajectories in mutually exclusive categories of participants with high TLC without high RV/TLC ([TLC]) versus high RV/TLC without high TLC ([RV/TLC]).

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  • - Alveolar type II (ATII) cells play a critical role in lung repair but their damage, often caused by cigarette smoke, contributes to the onset of emphysema, marked by destruction of alveolar walls.
  • - Researchers examined ATII cells from non-smokers, smokers, and emphysema patients, focusing on the protein PICT1 and its role in disease progression, using both human cell analysis and a murine model.
  • - Findings revealed decreased PICT1 levels in emphysema, linked to reduced DNA damage repair capabilities and mitochondrial dysfunction, suggesting that targeting PICT1 could lead to new treatments for the disease.
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  • Point of Care Ultrasound (POCUS) is used to assess pleural movement in patients with advanced emphysema, but its effectiveness in these patients is not well established.
  • A study evaluated ultrasound findings in 48 COPD patients and found a significant number showed abnormal patterns, such as absent lung sliding or a barcode appearance.
  • Results indicated there is limited correlation between ultrasound abnormalities and standard lung function measures, highlighting a need for cautious interpretation of POCUS in these cases.
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  • COPD has high mortality rates, especially when combined with cardiovascular disease, leading to an exploration of ECG markers (CIIS and P pulmonale) as predictors of adverse events in COPD patients.
  • A study involving 9448 patients revealed that those with CIIS ≥20 or P pulmonale had significantly higher odds of all-cause death, hospitalizations, and severe COPD exacerbations compared to those without these markers.
  • The findings indicate that using CIIS and P pulmonale could help identify patients at increased risk, and treatment with FF/UMEC/VI may reduce risks in patients with CIIS ≥20.
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  • Serum IgG deficiency is linked to increased risks of exacerbations in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), but the impact of lower normal range levels is uncertain.
  • A study involving 1,497 smokers analyzed the relationship between serum IgG levels and COPD exacerbations, finding that levels below the 35th percentile (1225 mg/dL) heightened exacerbation risk.
  • Specifically, low levels of IgG1 and IgG2 subclasses were significantly correlated with severe exacerbations, indicating that even mild impairments in IgG can affect disease severity in at-risk individuals.
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  • The study investigates how often to screen critically ill adults on ventilators and the best method for conducting spontaneous breathing trials (SBT) to successfully extubate them.
  • It involves a randomized clinical trial with 797 participants who required mechanical ventilation, comparing once-daily and more frequent screenings alongside two SBT techniques: pressure-supported and T-piece.
  • Results show no significant differences in the time to successful extubation based on screening frequency or SBT technique, indicating that both methods may be similarly effective.
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Impaired alveolar epithelial regeneration in patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is attributed to telomere dysfunction in type II alveolar epithelial cells (ACs). Genetic susceptibility, aging, and toxicant exposures, including tobacco smoke (TS), contribute to telomere dysfunction in ACs. Here we investigated whether improvement of telomere function plays a role in CSP7-mediated protection of ACs against ongoing senescence and apoptosis during bleomycin (BLM)-induced pulmonary fibrosis (PF) as well as alveolar injury caused by chronic TS exposure.

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Non-invasive ventilation (NIV) is the mainstay to treat patients who need augmentation of ventilation for acute and chronic forms of respiratory failure. The last several decades have witnessed an extension of the indications for NIV to a variety of acute and chronic lung diseases. Evolving advancements in technology and personalised approaches to patient care make it feasible to prioritise patient-centred care models that deliver home-based management using telemonitoring and telemedicine systems support.

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Background: Although COVID-19 is no longer a declared global health emergency, data remain limited on the impact of COVID-19 in lung transplant recipients.

Methods: We identified lung transplant recipients who were diagnosed with COVID-19 from March 2020 through August 2022 in our institutional database and investigated clinical outcomes. We then analyzed outcomes based on date of COVID-19 diagnosis (first wave March 2020-October 2020; second wave November 2020-2021; third wave December 2021-September 2022) and compared these results.

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