Commentary on 'Interventions for restoring patency of central venous catheter lumens'.

This is a commentary on a Cochrane review, published in this issue of EBCH, first published as: van Miert C, Hill R, Jones L. Interventions for restoring patency of occluded central venous catheter lumens. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2012, Issue 4.

Accuracy of the CoaguChek XS for point-of-care international normalized ratio (INR) measurement in children requiring warfarin.

Point-of-care INR (POC INR) meters can provide a safe and effective method for monitoring oral vitamin K antagonists (VKAs) in children. Stollery Children's Hospital has a large POC INR meter loan program for children requiring oral VKAs. Our protocol requires that POC INR results be compared to the standard laboratory INR for each child on several consecutive tests to ensure accuracy of CoaguChek XS (Roche Diagnostics, Basel Switzerland) meter.

Thrombosis in children with malignancy.

Purpose Of Review: The association between thrombosis and malignancy in adults is well known. Children are now surviving malignancies that previously resulted in mortality. Complications, however, occur including thrombosis that result in mortality and morbidity.