Treatment Outcome with High versus low-to-moderate Dosing of Corticosteroids in Early vis-a-vis Late-onset Hypoxic Cases of COVID-19: A Multicentric Retrospective Cohort Study.

Background: Corticosteroid dosing in COVID-19 cases associated with early-onset and late-onset hypoxia have not been separately explored.

Methods: In this retrospective cohort study, we divided hypoxic COVID-19 cases into groups based on timing of initiation of corticosteroids relative to onset of symptoms; Group A (≤6th day), Group B (7th-9th day) and Group C (≥10th day), each group being sub-grouped into high and low-to-moderate dose corticosteroid recipients. Cox regression with propensity scoring was used to compare 28-day mortality between high and low-to-moderate dose recipients separately in Group A, Group B, Group C.

Rapidly Fatal Silicosis Among Jewellery Workers Attending a District Medical College of West Bengal, India.

Background: Silicosis is a slowly progressive chronic occupational lung disease, developed after a prolong period of exposure to high concentration of silica dust.

Methods: In this longitudinal study, we enrolled old and new silicosis patients (n=19; 8 jewellery polishers, 11 from other occupations) seen at our Pulmonary Medicine Department from June 2009 to December 2012 to document the course of illness as per their occupational exposure.

Results: Six of the eight jewellery polishing workers had developed silicosis within five years of exposure, while six of the 11 other workers with other occupational exposure had developed silicosis after exposure of 10 years or more.

Bilateral pleural effusion with APLA positivity in a case of rhupus syndrome.

Rhupus syndrome is a rare syndrome characterized by overlap of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). Our patient was a diagnosed case of RA and developed SLE 2 years after. She was a middle-aged woman, presented with bilateral pleural effusion with exacerbation of skin and joint symptoms of SLE.

Small cell lung carcinoma associated with progressive systemic sclerosis.

The association between progressive systemic sclerosis (PSS) and malignancy is uncommon. The possibility of development of small cell carcinoma lung (SCLC), among all the reported lung malignancies in PSS patients is lowest. A fifty-five year old non-smoker female diagnosed as PSS for 1 year presented to our outpatient department with dry cough for 2 months, shortness of breath for the last 1 month and progressive facial and right upper limb oedema for the last 15 days.