Procalcitonin-guided duration of antibiotic treatment in children hospitalised with confirmed or suspected bacterial infection in the UK (BATCH): a pragmatic, multicentre, open-label, two-arm, individually randomised, controlled trial.

Background: Procalcitonin is a rapid response biomarker specific for bacterial infection, which is not routinely used in the UK National Health Service. We aimed to assess whether using a procalcitonin-guided algorithm would safely reduce the duration of antibiotic therapy compared with usual care, in which C-reactive protein is the commonly used biomarker.

Methods: The BATCH trial was a pragmatic, multicentre, open-label, parallel, two-arm, individually randomised, controlled trial conducted in 15 hospitals in England and Wales.

ISHLT consensus statement on the perioperative use of ECLS in lung transplantation: Part II: Intraoperative considerations.

The use of extracorporeal life support (ECLS) throughout the perioperative phase of lung transplantation requires nuanced planning and execution by an integrated team of multidisciplinary experts. To date, no multidisciplinary consensus document has examined the perioperative considerations of how to best manage these patients. To address this challenge, this perioperative utilization of ECLS in lung transplantation consensus statement was approved for development by the International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation Standards and Guidelines Committee.

Similarities of metabolomic disturbances in prematurity-associated obstructive lung disease to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

Prematurity-associated lung disease (PLD) is a long-term consequence of preterm-birth. Since the underlying mechanisms of PLD remain poorly characterised, we compared the urinary metabolome between recently described spirometry phenotypes of PLD. Preterm- and term-born children aged 7-12 years, from the Respiratory Health Outcomes in Neonates (RHiNO) cohort, underwent spirometry and urine collection.