Browsing by Author "Parrish, Andy"

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    AGREE to disagree: critical appraisal and the publication of practice guidelines
    (2014) Wiseman, Roger; Cohen, Karen; Gray, Andy; Jamaloodien, Khadija; Kredo, Tamara; Miot, Jacqui; Parrish, Andy; Taylor, Bettina; Blockman, Marc
    Faced by an explosion in available evidence for multiple new treatments, busy clinicians value guidelines that are clear, reliable, unbiased and locally applicable. Finding them can be difficult, however. The science of guideline development has moved rapidly in the past decade, resulting in a more robust and systematic process. However, just as the language of evidence-based medicine can be subverted to sound convincing while hiding errors and biases, so too guidelines may look convincing but lack many of the elements needed to ensure quality of care. In particular, the pharmaceutical and health technology industries are intensely aware of the marketing potential offered by widely disseminated and ostensibly neutral documents that ultimately influence medical practice.
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    Mortality in patients treated for tuberculous pericarditis in sub-Saharan Africa.
    (Health & Medical Publishing Group, 2008) Mayosi, Bongani M; Wiysonge, Charles Shey; Ntsekhe, Mpiko; Gumedze, Freedom; Volmink Jimmy A; Maartens, Gary; Aje, Akinyemi; Thomas, Baby M; Thomas, Kandathil M; Awotedu, Abolade A; Bongani, Thembela; Mntla, Phindile; Maritz, Frans; Blackett, Kathleen Ngu; Nkouonlack, Duquesne C; Burch, Vanessa C; Rebe, Kevin; Parrish, Andy; Sliwa, Karen; Vezi, Brian Z; Alam, Nowshad; Brown, Basil G; Gould, Trevor; Visser, Tim; Magula, Nombulelo P; Commerford, Patrick J
    Tuberculous pericarditis is one of the most severe forms of extrapulmonary tuberculosis, causing death or disability in a substantial proportion of affected people.1,2 In Africa, the incidence of tuberculous pericarditis is rising as a result of the HIV epidemic.3 The effect of HIV infection on survival in patients with tuberculous pericarditis is unknown.2,4 Whereas some investigators have suggested that HIV-infected patients with tuberculous pericarditis have a similar outcome to non-infected cases,5 others have shown that there may be an increase in mortality in HIV associated with tuberculous pericarditis.2,6,7 We established a prospective observational study, the Investigation of the Management of Pericarditis in Africa (IMPI Africa) registry, to obtain current information on the diagnosis, management and outcome of patients with presumed tuberculous pericarditis living in sub-Saharan Africa, where the burden of HIV infection is the greatest in the world.4,8-10 In this paper, we report the mortality rate and its predictors during the 6 months of antituberculosis treatment among patients enrolled in the regist