Identifying rare diseases using electronic medical records: the example of allergic bronchopulmonary aspergillosis.

Purpose: The purpose of the study is to evaluate whether primary care electronic medical records (EMRs) from patients with severe asthma can be used to identify allergic bronchopulmonary aspergillosis (ABPA) cases.

Methods: This cross-sectional feasibility study was conducted in adults with active and severe asthma registered with the Clinical Practice Research Datalink. A set of keywords flagged terms potentially indicative of ABPA in free-text comments of patients' EMRs to produce a grid on the basis of keywords' hit or miss.

Importance of feasibility assessments before implementing non-interventional pharmacoepidemiologic studies of vaccines: lessons learned and recommendations for future studies.

Purpose: Investigational and marketed vaccines are increasingly evaluated, and manufacturers are required to put in place mechanisms to monitor long-term benefit-risk profiles. However, generating such evidence in real-world settings remains challenging, especially when rare adverse events are assessed. Planning of an appropriate study design is key to conducting a valid study.

Risk of solid organ transplant rejection following vaccination with seasonal trivalent inactivated influenza vaccines in England: A self-controlled case-series.

Background: Annual seasonal influenza vaccination is recommended for transplant recipients. No formal pharmacoepidemiology study has been published on the association between solid organ transplant (SOT) rejection and vaccination with seasonal trivalent inactivated influenza vaccines (TIIVs).

Methods: The risk of SOT (liver, kidney, lung, heart or pancreas) rejection after TIIV vaccination was assessed using a self-controlled case-series method (NCT01715792).

Profile of adverse events in patients receiving treatment for malaria in urban Ghana: a cohort-event monitoring study.

Background: Antimalarial treatment strategies have changed much in the last 15 years, resulting in an increased variety of medicines available. Active pharmacovigilance methods are important for continued safety surveillance of these medicines, particularly in environments in which there is variability in treatments prescribed and limited confirmatory diagnostic capacity as well as limited ability of spontaneous reporting pharmacovigilance systems to generate much needed safety information quickly and efficiently.

Objective: Our objective was to use the cohort-event monitoring (CEM) technique to gather drug utilization and adverse event data for patients prescribed antimalarial medicines in an outpatient setting.

Epidemiological trends of dengue disease in Brazil (2000-2010): a systematic literature search and analysis.

Unlabelled: A literature survey and analysis was conducted to describe the epidemiology of dengue disease in Brazil reported between 2000 and 2010. The protocol was registered on PROSPERO (CRD42011001826: http://www.crd.