Factory packed and expired - about emergency insect sting kits.

Background: Patients allergic to insect venom are instructed to always carry emergency medication-an emergency kit. According to the current guidelines, these emergency kits should contain a H1-receptor-blocking antihistamine and corticosteroid for oral use, as well as an epinephrine inhaler and in particular situations an epinephrine auto-injector.

Patients And Methods: For quality management reasons patients with wasp venom allergy who presented for sting challenge provocation test were told to demonstrate their emergency kits.

A phase III, randomized, open label study to evaluate the safety and efficacy of imiquimod 5% cream applied thrice weekly for 8 and 12 weeks in the treatment of low-risk nodular basal cell carcinoma.

Objective: The present study was planned to evaluate the efficacy and tolerability of topical treatment with imiquimod in nodular basal cell carcinoma (nBCC).

Methods: One hundred two patients were randomized to receive thrice-weekly topical imiquimod for either 8 or 12 weeks. Twelve patients dropped out.

[Experiences with the new American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) classification of cutaneous melanoma].

A new AJCC/UICC staging classification of malignant melanoma was published in 2001 and has been in use since then. Compared to the TNM classification used for the previous 15 years, the new classification contains fundamental changes. The classification of the primary tumor is now based on newly defined classes for Breslow's tumor thickness (0 - 1.

Palliative therapy of disseminated malignant melanoma: a systematic review of 41 randomised clinical trials.

We undertook a systematic review of 41 randomised studies in disseminated melanoma, identified by a comprehensive search. We aimed to investigate rates of response to various treatment modalities and the outcome for the patients. We analysed seven studies that compared polychemotherapy with single-agent dacarbazine, six that compared different chemotherapeutic schedules with each other, five on the addition of tamoxifen to a reference therapy, and six that included non-specific immunostimulators.