More articles from Interpreting Key Trials
- Treating silent reflux disease does not improve poorly controlled asthma
A recent multicenter trial indicated that empirically prescribing a proton pump inhibitor does not help control asthma symptoms and that current guidelines need to be reevaluated.
- JUPITER to Earth: A statin helps people with normal LDL-C and high hs-CRP, but what does it mean?
How low should we go with low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and at what cost? What is the role of screening C-reactive protein? The JUPITER study partially answered these questions.
- A Clinician and Clinical Trialist’s Perspective
Even though more people died in the intensive-treatment group than in the standard-treatment group, the results from this trial should not substantially alter our usual approach to glucose-lowering.
- The Women’s Health Initiative: Implications for clinicians
Postmenopausal women who were randomized to follow a diet low in fat and high in fruits, vegetables, and grains did not have significantly lower rates of breast cancer, colon cancer, or cardiovascular disease. However, a long-term follow-up study is under way. What have we learned, and what are the implications for clinical practice?
- Interpreting the Charisma Study
In patients at risk of myocardial infarction or stroke, two antiplatelet drugs are not always better than one.
- The STAR*D study: Treating depression in the real world
This study found that depression can be treated successfully by primary care physicians under real-world conditions. The particular drug or drugs used are not as important as a rational plan.
- Interpreting the Spine Patient Outcomes Research Trial
The Spine Patient Outcomes Research Trial compared surgical and nonsurgical treatment in patients with radicular pain. The treatments were equivalent on intention-to-treat analysis, but up to 40% of patients in each group “crossed over” to the other treatment, muddying the results.
- Lung cancer screening: Is it time for a change in policy?
Whether screening with computed tomography should be adopted remains open to debate, despite two large studies that were recently reported.
- Interpreting the African American Heart Failure Trial(A-HEFT)
This placebo-controlled trial was the first to evaluate a therapy in a specific racial group, and it points the way to a more individualized approach to heart failure therapy.
- Interpreting the ASTEROID Trial
The optimal strategy for lipid-lowering in patients with coronary artery disease may be to aim for the lowest low-density lipoprotein cholesterol level that can be attained without adverse effects.