Research reviews

Although hospital admissions for food anaphylaxis increased over the past 20 years in the UK the case fatality rate more than halved, an analysis of national data has shown.

Tailoring choice of antihypertensives to the patient rather than using strict age criteria might be more beneficial, the authors of a UK observational cohort study suggest.

Men and women, under the age of 25, with problem gambling are at increased risk of trying to take their own lives, a UK study has found.

Acamprosate was the only intervention with evidence that it was better than placebo in maintaining alcohol abstinence for up to 12 months, following detoxification, in a network meta-analysis.

A study based on the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) suggests that loneliness is an independent risk factor for diabetes.

Consensually nonmonogamous partnerships, including open relationships, comprise a substantial proportion of sexual relationships in the USA, a national population-based survey has concluded. It is important to be non-judgemental when eliciting sexual histories, to discuss risks and offer the right tests to the right people to minimise STI/HIV transmission.

Between 2008 and 2017 smokers appear to have become less dependent on cigarettes but also less likely to try to quit or cut down. For those who tried to quit, fewer used behavioural support and more used pharmacological support, a study has found.

Use of oral or inhaled corticosteroids appears to be an independent risk factor for osteoporosis and fragility fractures in patients with asthma, a UK population-based study has found.

Engagement with hepatitis C treatment by people who inject drugs is associated with a lower risk of all-cause mortality and drug-related death, a study set in Scotland has found.

A nationwide case-control study from Denmark has strengthened the evidence that parental asthma and smoking in pregnancy are risk factors for onset of asthma and persistent wheezing in children. The results also suggest that exposure to ambient small particles < 2.5 µm (PM_2.5) may be a potential risk factor. However, this finding needs to be substantiated in future studies, the authors say.

Loneliness but not social isolation appears to be an independent risk factor for cardiovascular disease, an analysis of data from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing suggests.

Asthma that starts in childhood and persists throughout adult life tends to be more severe and is associated with poorer lung function compared with adult-onset asthma, a study from Japan has concluded. The difference in clinical characteristics points to a distinct phenotype.

Errors in prescribing, supervised or non-supervised dispensing, and monitoring and communication were responsible for patient safety incidents in opioid substitution treatment, a study from England and Wales has shown.

An observational study using clinical case records has found a ten-fold increased risk of sudden unexpected death in infancy (SUDI) in siblings of SUDI cases.

More than a third of smokers who completed a pilot study of e-cigarettes as a smoking cessation aid quit smoking.

Daily emollient use for the first 12 months of life did not protect against the development of eczema in high-risk children, a UK study has found. Infants born at full term were recruited to a randomised controlled trial carried out at 12 hospitals and four primary care sites across the UK between 2014 and 2016. All the infants were deemed at high risk of developing eczema because of a family history of atopic disease i.e. at least one first-degree relative with parent reported eczema, allergic rhinitis, or asthma diagnosed by a doctor.

A Scandinavian observational study has shown that sodium-glucose co-transporter 2 (SGLT2) inhibitors are associated with a significant reduction in serious renal events compared with dipeptidyl peptidase-4 (DPP-4) inhibitors. The study used Scandinavian disease registry data to compare population outcomes in the general diabetic population rather than selected groups of high-risk patients.

Intrauterine exposure to maternal smoking is associated with an increased risk of fractures in the first year of life, a national cohort study from Sweden has found. The study cohort comprised 1,680,307 live born singletons in Sweden, born between 1 January 1983 and 31 December 2000, followed up until 31 December 2014.

Physiotherapy to improve ankle strength and balance produced sustained improvements in functional status in patients with diabetic peripheral neuropathy, in a study from Singapore.

There has been a significant increase in the use of long-acting reversible contraception in women under 25 over the past decade, a national survey has found. However, condoms and the oral contraceptive pill are still the most commonly used methods.

Current guidelines advise treating paroxysmal AF in the same way as sustained AF but the evidence is weak, with only one retrospective analysis comparing the risk of stroke in patients with paroxysmal AF vs chronic AF (analysis of the SPAF trials, performed 15 years ago and limited to patients treated with aspirin). The ACTIVE W trial showed that warfarin is more effective than aspirin plus clopidogrel for the prevention of vascular events (stroke, embolism, MI and vascular death) in patients with AF. A recent substudy of this trial looked at the risk of stroke in 1,202 patients with paroxysmal AF compared with 5,495 with sustained AF, and the effectiveness of thromboprophylaxis in these patients. ' This substudy has shown that the risk of stroke is similar, irrespective of whether AF is paroxysmal or sustained, and that anticoagulation therapy is equally effective in both groups. Other factors, such as age and cardiovascular comorbidity, remain central to the ultimate choice of thromboprophylaxis in these patients.'