Purpose: Pulmonary hypertension (PH) is a heterogenous, often progressive disorder leading to right heart failure and death. Previous analyses show stable PH mortality rates from 1980 to 2001 but increasing from 2001 to 2010 especially among women and non-Hispanic (NH) Black. This study seeks to identify recent trends in PH mortality in the United States from 1999 to 2019. Methods: Mortality rates among individuals more than or equal to 15 years of age were obtained from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Wide-Ranging Online Data for Epidemiology Research (WONDER) database. ICD-10 codes were used to identify individuals with PH. Results: Between 1999 and 2019, PH was included as a cause on 429,105 recorded deaths. The average age-adjusted PH mortality rate was 7.9 per 100,000 individuals and increased by 1.9% per year. Higher age-adjusted mortality rates were experienced by females and NH Black persons. The crude mortality rate was 105.4 per 100,000 among those decedents 85 or older. From 1999 to 2019, mortality in PH and left heart disease co-occurrence increased at nearly double the annual rate of the overall PH group. Conclusions: Despite therapeutic advances for selected PH subgroups, the overall age-adjusted PH mortality rate increased significantly from 1999 to 2019 and previously reported racial disparities have persisted. These findings emphasize the need for additional study to improve outcomes in PH.

Background: Post-treatment morbidity among subjects with drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB) is unclear. Methods: This was a cross-sectional study of patients from Tbilisi, Georgia with cavitary DR-TB and an outcome of cure. Participants had a chest X-ray (CXR), St. George Respiratory Quality (SGRQ) survey, and pulmonary function tests (PFTs) performed. Correlations between SGRQ and PFT results and factors associated with pulmonary impairment were examined. Results: Among 58 subjects (median age 31 years), 40% used tobacco, 59% had prior TB, and 47% underwent adjunctive surgical resection. The median follow-up time was 41 months. Follow-up CXR revealed fibrosis in 30 subjects (52%) and bronchiectasis in seven (12%). The median forced expiratory volume (FEV 1 )/forced vital capacity (FVC) ratio was 0.72, with 24 subjects (41%) having a ratio of ≤0.70. Significant correlations existed between PFT measures and overall and component SGRQ scores. In linear regression, age, prior TB, and CXR fibrosis or bronchiectasis were significantly associated with decreased pulmonary function. Adjunctive surgery was significantly associated with a higher percent predicted FEV 1 and FVC. Conclusions: A high proportion of DR-TB subjects had residual pulmonary impairment, particularly with recurrent TB and severe radiological disease. The association of surgical resection with improved lung function deserves further study. PFTs and SGRQ may both be useful to evaluate lung health.

Introduction Current medications for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) have not been shown to impact patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs), highlighting the need for accurate minimal clinically important difference (MCID) values. Recently published consensus standards for MCID studies support using anchor-based over distribution-based methods. The aim of this study was to estimate MCID values for worsening in IPF using only an anchor-based approach. Methods We conducted secondary analyses of three randomised controlled trials with different inclusion criteria and follow-up intervals. The health transition question in the 36-Item Short-Form Health Survey (SF-36) questionnaire was used as the anchor. We used receiver operating curves to assess responsiveness between the anchor and 10 variables (four physiological measures and six PROMs). We used an anchorbased method to determine the MCID values of variables that met the responsiveness criteria (area under the curve ⩾0.70). Results 6-min walk distance (6MWD), the St George’s Respiratory Questionnaire (SGRQ), physical component score (PCS) of SF-36 and University of California, San Diego, Shortness of Breath Questionnaire (UCSD SOBQ) met the responsiveness criteria. The MCID value for 6MWD was −75 m; the MCID value for SF-36 PCS was −7 points; the MCID value for SGRQ was 11 points; and the MCID value for the UCSD SOBQ was 11 points. Conclusions The MCID estimates of 6MWD, SGRQ, SF-36 and UCSD SOBQ using only anchor-based methods were considerably higher compared to previously proposed values. A single MCID value may not be applicable across all classes of disease severity or durations of follow-up time.

Describe the longitudinal national epidemiology of tracheostomies performed in acute care hospitals and describe the annual rate of tracheostomy performed for patients with respiratory failure with invasive mechanical ventilation. DESIGN: Serial cross-sectional study. Setting: The 2002-2014 and 2016-2017 Healthcare Utilization Project's National Inpatient Sample datasets. Patients: Discharges greater than or equal to 18 years old, excluding those with head and neck cancer or transferred from another hospital. We used diagnostic and procedure codes from the International Classification of Diseases, 9th and 10th revisions to define cases of respiratory failure, invasive mechanical ventilation, and tracheostomy. Interventions: None. Measurements and Main Results: There were an estimated 80,612 tracheostomies performed in 2002, a peak of 89,545 tracheostomies in 2008, and a nadir of 58,840 tracheostomies in 2017. The annual occurrence rate was 37.5 (95% CI, 34.7-40.4) tracheostomies per 100,000 U.S. adults in 2002, with a peak of 39.7 (95% CI, 36.5-42.9) in 2003, and with a nadir of 28.4 (95% CI, 27.2-29.6) in 2017. Specifically, among the subgroup of hospital discharges with respiratory failure with invasive mechanical ventilation, an annual average of 9.6% received tracheostomy in the hospital. This changed over the study period from 10.4% in 2002, with a peak of 10.9% in 2004, and with a nadir of 7.4% in 2017. Among respiratory failure with invasive mechanical ventilation discharges with tracheostomy, the annual proportion of patients 50-59 and 60-69 years old increased, whereas patients from 70 to 79 and greater than or equal to 80 years old decreased. The mean hospital length of stay decreased, and in-hospital mortality decreased, whereas discharge to intermediate care facilities increased. Conclusions: Over the study period, there were decreases in the annual total case volume and adult occurrence rate of tracheostomy as well as decreases in the rate of tracheostomy among the subgroup with respiratory failure with invasive mechanical ventilation. There is some evidence of changing patterns of patient selection for in-hospital tracheostomy among those with respiratory failure with invasive mechanical ventilation with decreasing proportions of patients with advanced age.

In February, 2016, The Third International Consensus Definitions for Sepsis and Septic Shock (Sepsis-3) made a splash in the field of critical care medicine.1 In Altmetric.com's stylised world of impact metrics, this article scores in the top 99th percentile of publications of a similar age; not surprising, since the Consensus recommended the most substantive changes to the definition and clinical criteria for sepsis since the original 1992 description.2,3 Despite this, the clinical criteria might not have been readily accepted by some readers given their retrospective derivation from large datasets of inpatients in intensive care units and hospital wards, but not emergency departments, and clinical criteria that perhaps confusingly differed by setting.

Rationale: Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is an acute hypoxemic respiratory failure seen in critically ill patients after an inciting injury. The burden of ARDS mortality in the United States in recent years is not well characterized. Objectives: In this study, we aimed to describe trends in the annual incidence of ARDS mortality in the United States from 1999 to 2013. We also describe demographic characteristics, geographic and seasonal trends, and other associated underlying causes of death in this population. Methods: Data on all deceased U.S. residents are available through the Multiple Cause of Death (MCOD) database of the National Center for Health Statistics. ARDS-related deaths were identified in the MCOD database using International Classification of Diseases, 10th Revision. Measurements and Main Results: Aggregate annual crude and age-adjusted mortality rates and mortality rate ratios were used to compare various demographic subpopulations. Over the 15-year period, the national ARDS-related age-adjusted mortality rate demonstrated an annual seasonal variation, peaking in winter. The annual rate decreased in a nonlinear fashion, with a plateau from 2010 to 2013. The ARDS-related age-adjusted mortality rate was 5.01 per 100,000 persons (95% confidence interval, 4.92-5.09) in 1999 and 2.82 per 100,000 persons (95% confidence interval, 2.76-2.88) in 2013. Males had a higher average ARDS-related mortality rate than did females. Asian/Pacific Islanders had the lowest average ageadjusted ARDS-related mortality rate, and black/African-American individuals, the highest. Conclusions: National age-adjusted ARDS-related mortality rates decreased between 1999 and 2013 in the United States, yet still show relative racial and sex disparities. However, death certificates largely underestimate the overall mortality burden from ARDS when compared with studies of clinically ascertained cases.

A recent article by Barbash et al. reported on the first publically available, 2017 data of United States (US) hospital performance on the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) “Early Management Bundle for Severe Sepsis/Septic Shock” (SEP-1) quality measure [1]. They demonstrate that 87% of hospitals reported SEP-1 data, at an average compliance with all elements of the bundle of 49% (standard deviation (SD) 19%). In addition to their demonstrating the hospital characteristics associated with high SEP-1 performance, an aggregated state-level description is an important complimentary analysis given the state-specific sepsis quality mandates and initiatives existing and forthcoming. Specifically, pre-dating SEP-1 and beginning in 2014, New York required hospitals to implement sepsis care protocols. Also at the time of writing, Illinois and New Jersey are adopting similar mandates while Ohio and Wisconsin are adopting sepsis public health initiatives [2–4].

The growing basic and clinical investigations into the extraskeletal effects of vitamin D have revealed roles in the functioning of the immune system, generating interesting questions about this nutrient's connections to sepsis. This article briefly reviews the current science of the function of vitamin D in the immune system as well as the emerging clinical literature regarding its associations with respiratory infections, sepsis, and critical illness. Finally, we offer views on the potential future directions for research in the field by outlining potential relevant scenarios and outcomes.

Background: Differentiating sepsis from the systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) in critical care patients is challenging, especially before serious organ damage is evident, and with variable clinical presentations of patients and variable training and experience of attending physicians. Our objective was to describe and quantify physician agreement in diagnosing SIRS or sepsis in critical care patients as a function of available clinical information, infection site, and hospital setting. Methods: We conducted a post hoc analysis of previously collected data from a prospective, observational trial (N = 249 subjects) in intensive care units at seven US hospitals, in which physicians at different stages of patient care were asked to make diagnostic calls of either SIRS, sepsis, or indeterminate, based on varying amounts of available clinical information (clinicaltrials.gov identifier: NCT02127502). The overall percent agreement and the free-marginal, inter-observer agreement statistic kappa (κ free ) were used to quantify agreement between evaluators (attending physicians, site investigators, external expert panelists). Logistic regression and machine learning techniques were used to search for significant variables that could explain heterogeneity within the indeterminate and SIRS patient subgroups. Results: Free-marginal kappa decreased between the initial impression of the attending physician and (1) the initial impression of the site investigator (κ free 0.68), (2) the consensus discharge diagnosis of the site investigators (κ free 0.62), and (3) the consensus diagnosis of the external expert panel (κ free 0.58). In contrast, agreement was greatest between the consensus discharge impression of site investigators and the consensus diagnosis of the external expert panel (κ free 0.79). When stratified by infection site, κ free for agreement between initial and later diagnoses had a mean value + 0.24 (range-0.29 to + 0.39) for respiratory infections, compared to + 0.70 (range + 0.42 to + 0.88) for abdominal + urinary + other infections. Bioinformatics analysis failed to clearly resolve the indeterminate diagnoses and also failed to explain why 60% of SIRS patients were treated with antibiotics. Conclusions: Considerable uncertainty surrounds the differential clinical diagnosis of sepsis vs. SIRS, especially before organ damage has become highly evident, and for patients presenting with respiratory clinical signs. Our findings underscore the need to provide physicians with accurate, timely diagnostic information in evaluating possible sepsis.

Vitamin D insufficiency and sepsis are both highly prevalent worldwide problems and this article reviews the emerging science that is defining the intersections of these conditions. The importance of vitamin D’s role in skeletal health has long been understood but recent evidence is beginning to highlight its role in the functioning of other physiologic systems of the body. Basic science data reveal its integral role in local immune responses to pathogens and the systemic inflammatory pathways of sepsis. Furthermore, clinical scientists have found associations with respiratory infections, critical illness and sepsis but the causal relationship and its clinical impact have yet to be clearly defined. The article ends with speculations on the connections between racial disparities and seasonal differences in sepsis and vitamin D insufficiency.