Enhancing end-of-life care practices on the medicine units: perspectives from nurses and families.

Background: Death is a part of life. While most often a sombre event, opportunities exist to optimise the experience both for the dying patient and their loved ones. This is especially true in institutionalised settings, such as acute care hospitals where cure and recovery tend to be paramount.

Opioid Allergy Cross-Reactivity: A Retrospective Study Across Three Opioid Classes.

IgE-mediated opioid hypersensitivities, or true allergies, are rare and most adverse reactions to opioids can be attributed to side effects or to pseudo-allergies. Given that immune-mediated allergies to opioids are uncommon, literature regarding cross-reactivity among opioid classes are limited. This retrospective study aimed to determine the rates of cross-reactivity and tolerance among patients with previously documented opioid allergy or adverse drug reaction (ADR) across three opioid drug classes (natural, semisynthetic, and synthetic opioids).

Mode of Action of Psyllium in Reducing Gas Production from Inulin and its Interaction with Colonic Microbiota: A 24 hours, Randomised, Placebo-Controlled Trial in Healthy Human Volunteers.

Background: Recent studies show that the increase in breath hydrogen (BH) and symptoms after ingestion of inulin is reduced by co-administering psyllium.

Objectives: To determine if slowing delivery of inulin to the colon by administering it in divided doses would mimic the effect of psyllium. Primary endpoint was the BH area under the curve AUC.