Principles of environmentally-sustainable anaesthesia: a global consensus statement from the World Federation of Societies of Anaesthesiologists

The Earth’s mean surface temperature is already approximately 1.1°C higher than pre-industrial levels. Exceeding a mean 1.5°C rise by 2050 will make global adaptation to the consequences of climate change less possible. To protect public health, anaesthesia providers need to reduce the contribution their practice makes to global warming. We convened a Working Group of 45 anaesthesia providers with a recognised interest in sustainability, and used a three-stage modified Delphi consensus process to agree on principles of environmentally sustainable anaesthesia that are achievable worldwide. The Working Group agreed on the following three important underlying statements: patient safety should not be compromised by sustainable anaesthetic practices; high-, middle- and low-income countries should support each other appropriately in delivering sustainable healthcare (including anaesthesia); and healthcare systems should be mandated to reduce their contribution to global warming. We set out seven fundamental principles to guide anaesthesia providers in the move to environmentally sustainable practice, including: choice of medications and equipment; minimising waste and overuse of resources; and addressing environmental sustainability in anaesthetists’ education, research, quality improvement and local healthcare leadership activities. These changes are achievable with minimal material resource and financial investment, and should undergo re-evaluation and updates as better evidence is published. This paper discusses each principle individually, and directs readers towards further important references.     

Mesenchymal neoplasms with NTRK and other kinase gene alterations

Kinase alterations are increasingly recognised as oncogenic drivers in mesenchymal tumours. Infantile fibrosarcoma and the related renal tumour, congenital mesoblastic nephroma, were among the first solid tumours shown to harbour recurrent tyrosine kinase fusions, with the canonical ETV6::NTRK3 fusion identified more than 20 years ago. Although targeted testing has long been used in diagnosis, the advent of more robust sequencing techniques has driven the discovery of kinase alterations in an array of mesenchymal tumours. As our ability to identify these genetic alterations has improved, as has our recognition and understanding of the tumours that harbour these alterations. Specifically, this study will focus upon mesenchymal tumours harbouring NTRK or other kinase alterations, including tumours with an infantile fibrosarcoma-like appearance, spindle cell tumours resembling lipofibromatosis or peripheral nerve sheath tumours and those occurring in adults with a fibrosarcoma-like appearance. As publications describing the histology of these tumours increase so, too, do the variety kinase alterations reported, now including NTRK1/2/3, RET, MET, RAF1, BRAF, ALK, EGFR and ABL1 fusions or alterations. To date, these tumours appear locally aggressive and rarely metastatic, without a clear link between traditional features used in histological grading (e.g. mitotic activity, necrosis) and outcome. However, most of these tumours are amenable to new targeted therapies, making their recognition of both diagnostic and therapeutic import. The goal of this study is to review the clinicopathological features of tumours with NTRK and other tyrosine kinase alterations, discuss the most common differential diagnoses and provide recommendations for molecular confirmation with associated treatment implications.     

Risk as a pattern over time: Delineation of time-dependent risk factors in biological,psychological, and social variables in cancer patients

Background

Survival in cancer patients is associated with a multitude of biological, social, and psychological factors. Although it is well established that all these factors add to overall mortality, it is not well understood how the predictive power of these parameters changes in a comprehensive model and over time.

Methods

Patients who attended the authors’ outpatient clinic were invited to participate. The authors followed 5180 mixed cancer patients (51.1% female; mean age, 59.1 years [SD = 13.8]) for up to 16 years and analyzed biological (age, sex, cancer site, anemia), psychological (anxiety, depression), and social variables (marital status, education, employment status) potentially predicting overall survival in a Cox proportional hazards model.

Results

The median survival time for the entire sample was 4.3 years (95% confidence interval, 4.0–4.7). The overall survival probabilities for 1 and 10 years were 76.8% and 38.0%, respectively. Following an empirical approach, the authors split the time interval into five periods: acute, subacute, short-term, medium-term, and long-term. A complex pattern of variables predicted overall survival differently in the five periods. Biological parameters were important throughout most of the time, social parameters were either time-independent predictors or tended to be more important in the longer term. Of the psychological parameters, only depression was a significant predictor and lost its predictive power in the long-term.

Conclusions

The findings of this study allow the development of comprehensive patient-specific models of risk and resilience factors addressing biopsychosocial needs of cancer patients, paving the way for a personalized treatment plan that goes beyond biomedical cancer care.     

腹部超声联合阴道灌注0.9%氯化钠诊断幼女阴道异物的临床价值

目的 分析腹部超声联合阴道灌注0.9%氯化钠对幼女阴道异物的诊断价值。方法 回顾性分析2018年1月—2021年12月就诊于赣州市妇幼保健院妇科的102例疑似阴道异物幼女临床资料。患儿均接受经腹部超声、阴道灌注0.9%氯化钠检查。以宫腔镜诊治结果作为金标准，分析经腹部超声单独检测或腹部超声联合阴道灌注0.9%氯化钠诊断阴道异物的准确性、有效性。结果 宫腔镜结果显示，患儿中阴道炎有21例（20.59%），阴道异物有81例（79.42%），其中棉絮状物、谷物、头发丝等线状物最为常见；单独诊断、联合诊断出阴道异物分别有69例和79例，与宫腔镜诊断结果的K值分别为0.689和0.897。将宫腔镜诊断结果作为金标准，单独诊断、联合诊断阴道异物的敏感性分别为0.765（95% CI：0.594，0.816）、0.951（95% CI：0.826，0.995），特异性分别为0.667（95% CI：0.563，0.786）、0.905（95% CI：0.795，0.972），准确度分别为0.745（95% CI：0.586，0.813）、0.941（95% CI：0.817，0.984），单独诊断、联合诊断的敏感性、特异性、准确度可信区间无重叠，说明有统计学意义。结论 阴道灌注0.9%氯化钠可增强幼女阴道异物在超声下的显影，提升诊断准确性、有效性，且操作简单、损伤小，起到清洁阴道作用。     

发达国家医学生器官捐献意愿研究现状的范围综述

目的了解发达国家医学生器官捐献意愿研究的目的、结果、障碍因素和解决对策。 方法以主题词和自由词联合的方式对PubMed、Web of Science、Ovid MEDLINE、Ovid EMBASE(Excerpta Medica)、EBSCOhost Complete和Cochrane Library等已发表文献数据库，以及灰色文献数据库York Centre for Reviews and Dissemination、Open Grey、ProQuest Dissertation and Theses和Mednar进行系统、全面地检索，并采用Arksey和O′Malley提出的范围综述框架进行文献资料整合。 结果共纳入17项发达国家医学生器官捐献意愿研究。研究背景主要为医学生未来对于公众器官捐献有着重要影响。研究结果表明，大多数医学生器官捐献意愿性良好，但不同亚组的研究结果不一；其最主要的障碍因素为医学生器官捐献相关知识的缺乏；解决对策主要为施予系统化、结构化和可评价的教育课程。 结论21世纪以来发达国家医学生器官捐献意愿研究方兴未艾，其研究的多层面、多角度以及揭示的问题、寻求的解决对策，可对我国现阶段医学生器官捐献的研究提供一定参考。