Survey on the Situation of Medical Departments in the Pharmaceutical Industry in Spain.

Introduction: Medical departments have evolved from a position of support to one of strategic leadership. The number of tasks and the complexity of interactions in which they are involved is increasing. However, the spectrum of their activity in the sector differs significantly from one company to another.

Use of edoxaban in clinical practice: Comparison of data from the Spanish population in the ETNA-AF-Europe registry.

To ascertain the clinical profile and management of edoxaban in clinical practice. Prospective, noninterventional postauthorization study of nonselected patients with atrial fibrillation treated with edoxaban from 12 European countries. Patients' baseline characteristics are presented.

Renal transplantation in patients with hepatitis C virus antibody. A long national experience.

Background. Renal transplantation is the best therapy for patients with hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection with end-stage renal disease. Patient and graft survival are lower in the long term compared with HCV-negative patients.

Improved renal function, with similar proteinuria, after two years of early tacrolimus withdrawal from a regimen of sirolimus plus tacrolimus.

Results at 1 year of a pilot randomized trial with 87 kidney graft recipients, comparing the maintenance treatment with sirolimus, tacrolimus and steroids (group I) versus tacrolimus withdrawal since the third month onward, followed by maintenance with SRL and steroids (group II) have shown that early elimination of tacrolimus may result in improved renal function and blood pressure control. At 2 years, 26 and 25 patients in groups I and II, respectively, were analyzed in an on-therapy and an ITT analysis. In the on-therapy analysis, group II showed lower serum creatinine (1.

Peripheral blood lymphocyte populations in end-stage liver diseases.

Goals/background: The aim of this study was to decipher whether end-stage liver failure modifies peripheral blood lymphocytes (PBL) in a homogeneous manner, independently of the base pathology, or, if on the contrary, PBL subsets show a different profile in each hepatic disease.

Methods: We studied PBL subsets in 71 patients with end-stage liver disease, before liver transplant, and 74 healthy controls by flow cytometry. The results were statistically compared between patients and controls, and cohorts of patients classified according to their base pathology.

A novel RMRP mutation in a Spanish patient with cartilage-hair hypoplasia.

Cartilage-hair hypoplasia (CHH), or McKusick type metaphyseal chondrodysplasia, was first recognized as a distinct entity in the Old Order Amish in the USA, but was later identified in other groups, and found to be unusually frequent among Finns. CHH is highly pleiotropic with manifestations that include short stature, defective cellular immunity and predisposition to several cancers. CHH is caused by mutations in the RNA component of RNase MRP (RMRP, ribonuclease mitochondrial RNA processing) and is transmitted as an autosomal recessive trait.

Rapid molecular diagnosis of ataxia-telangiectasia by optimised RT-PCR and direct sequencing analysis.

Ataxia-telangiectasia (A-T) is a severe autosomal recessive disorder involving cerebellar degeneration, immunodeficiency, chromosomal instability, radiosensitivity, and cancer predisposition. A-T results from mutations in a single gene (ataxia-telangiectasia mutated, ATM) on chromosome 11 that encodes a 3056 amino acid protein (ATM). The purpose of this study is the design of an easy and rapid method for the molecular diagnosis of A-T which could be applied to clinical diagnosis, genetic counselling, carrier prediction, and prenatal diagnosis.