Publications by authors named "Tobias Liebregts"

The number of patients with active cancer continues to rise and leads to increased emergency department visits. The symptoms are frequently associated with the underlying malignancy and include dyspnea, fever, pain, as well as gastrointestinal and neurological complaints. Hospitalization and intensive care unit admission rates are high and impose a significant burden on resource utilization.

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Approximately 20% of intensive care unit (ICU) patients have cancer, and their prognosis has markedly improved in recent years. In addition to improved treatment in the ICU, this is a result of advancements in cancer therapies, including the use of targeted therapies (TTs), such as antibodies and small-molecule kinase inhibitors. Despite the increasing use of TT, there are currently no comprehensive studies examining critically ill cancer patients receiving TT in the ICU.

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Article Synopsis
  • Platelet transfusions are commonly administered in ICUs for patients with low platelet counts (thrombocytopenia), but the specific practices and their outcomes are not well-documented.
  • In a study of 504 ICU patients across Europe and the U.S., 20.8% received platelet transfusions, primarily using pooled products, with varying practices in dosage and volume across different countries.
  • The research found that while platelet transfusions are frequent, they provide limited increases in platelet counts, indicating potential inconsistencies in their effectiveness and administration practices.
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Introduction: Platelet transfusions are frequently used in intensive care unit (ICU) patients, but contemporary epidemiological data are sparse. We aim to present contemporary international data on the use of platelet transfusions in adult ICU patients with thrombocytopenia.

Methods: This is a protocol and statistical analysis plan for a post hoc sub-study of 504 thrombocytopenic patients from the 'Thrombocytopenia and platelet transfusions in ICU patients: an international inception cohort study (PLOT-ICU)'.

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Article Synopsis
  • Thrombocytopenia, defined as a low platelet count, is a frequent issue in ICU patients and is linked to poorer health outcomes, including higher mortality rates.
  • A study involving 1166 ICU patients across 52 ICUs in 10 countries found that 43.2% had thrombocytopenia, with nearly one-quarter presenting with it upon admission.
  • Thrombocytopenia at ICU admission was statistically associated with increased 90-day mortality, and while 22.6% of those affected received platelet transfusions, the majority were given as a precautionary measure.
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Tumor patients nowadays show significantly improved survival rates due to advancements in modern intensive care medicine, particularly in the case of organ failure. The previous reluctance towards implementing intensive medical care measures in patients with a tumorous disease is no longer justified. For successful intensive care treatment, the timing and the mode of admission along with the specific intensive care measures and underlying organ dysfunction(s) are crucial factors for the prognosis.

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A growing number of patients are living with cancer or have a history of cancer leading to increasing adverse effects of treatment or disease necessitating emergency department (ED) consultation. Long-term cancer survivors are at higher risk of comorbidities causing a substantial increase in health care resource utilization. The most frequent reasons for cancer-related ED visits are dyspnea, fever, pain, gastrointestinal or neurological symptoms leading to high hospital and intensive care unit admission rates.

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Combined advances in haematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT) and intensive care management have improved the survival of patients with haematological malignancies admitted to the intensive care unit. In cases of refractory respiratory failure or refractory cardiac failure, these advances have led to a renewed interest in advanced life support therapies, such as extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), previously considered inappropriate for these patients due to their poor prognosis. Given the scarcity of evidence-based guidelines on the use of ECMO in patients receiving HCT and the need to provide equitable and sustainable access to ECMO, the European Society of Intensive Care Medicine, the Extracorporeal Life Support Organization, and the International ECMO Network aimed to develop an expert consensus statement on the use of ECMO in adult patients receiving HCT.

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Chronic graft-vs-host-disease (cGvHD) is the most relevant long-term complication after allogeneic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) with major impact on non-relapse mortality, but data on intensive care unit (ICU) outcome are missing. In this retrospective, multicenter study we analyzed 174 adult HSCT recipients with cGvHD requiring intensive care treatment. Skin, pulmonary, liver, and intestinal involvement were present in 76.

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Introduction: Thrombocytopenia is frequent in intensive care unit (ICU) patients and has been associated with worse outcome. Platelet transfusions are often used in the management of ICU patients with severe thrombocytopenia. However, the reported frequencies of thrombocytopenia and platelet transfusion practices in the ICU vary considerably.

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Introduction: Patients with hematologic disease are at high risk of morbidity and mortality from COVID-19 due to disease-inherent and therapy-related immunodeficiency. Whether infection with the SARS-CoV2 omicron variant leads to attenuated disease severity in these patients is currently unknown.

Methods: We assessed clinical and laboratory parameters in 61 patients with underlying hematologic conditions with a SARS-CoV2 omicron variant infection confirmed by nucleic acid amplification testing.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study investigates whether cancer patients with severe respiratory failure gain any survival benefits from using veno-venous extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (vv-ECMO).
  • It analyzes data from 297 cancer patients treated with vv-ECMO between 2009 and 2019 across German and Austrian hospitals, revealing a low 60-day overall survival rate of 26.8%.
  • Findings indicate that factors like low platelet count, high lactate levels, and certain disease statuses negatively impact survival, but the study concludes that the overall efficacy of vv-ECMO in these patients remains uncertain, highlighting the need for further research.
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Cytomegalovirus (CMV) reactivation is a frequent complication after allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT), whose impact on clinical outcome, in particular on leukemic relapse, is controversial. We retrospectively analyzed 687 HCT recipients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and ciclosporin-based immunosuppression to better understand the differential impact of CMV on transplant outcomes depending on AML disease stage and in vivo T cell depletion with antithymocyte globulin (ATG). Without ATG, CMV reactivation associated with significantly reduced relapse, yet its effect was more pronounced for advanced disease AML (P = .

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Acute respiratory failure (ARF) is the main reason for ICU admission following allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT). Extracorporeal CO removal (ECCO R) can be used as an adjunct to mechanical ventilation in patients with severe hypercapnia but has not been assessed in HSCT recipients. Retrospective analysis of all allogeneic HSCT recipients ≥18 years treated with ECCO R at two HSCT centers.

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Objectives: Primary objectives • To assess the time from randomisation until an improvement within 84 days defined as two points on a seven point ordinal scale or live discharge from the hospital in high-risk patients (group 1 to group 4) with SARS-CoV-2 infection requiring hospital admission by infusion of plasma from subjects after convalescence of SARS-CoV-2 infection or standard of care. Secondary objectives • To assess overall survival, and the overall survival rate at 28 56 and 84 days. • To assess SARS-CoV-2 viral clearance and load as well as antibody titres.

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Acute chest syndrome (ACS) in adult patients with sickle cell disease represents a leading cause of death. It is characterized by a new density on chest X-ray accompanied by fever and/or respiratory symptoms. Currently, 49 adult patients with sickle cell disease are registered at our department.

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Prophylaxis of graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HCT) remains challenging. Because prospective randomized trials of in-vivo T cell depletion using anti-T-lymphocyte globulin (ATLG) in addition to a calcineurin inhibitor and methotrexate (MTX) led to conflicting outcome results, we evaluated the impact of ATLG on clinical outcome, lymphocyte- and immune reconstitution survival models. In total, 1500 consecutive patients with hematologic malignancies received matched unrelated donor (MUD) HCT with cyclosporin and MTX (N = 723, 48%) or with additional ATLG (N = 777, 52%).

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Despite treatment options of cancer patients have been improved, the treatment of complications is usually very complex and often includes intensive care unit admission. Infections play a major role here. Risk patients and factors, timely detection of infections and septic states, diagnostic options and treatment options in the management of these cancer patients will be presented in this paper.

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Background: With Sepsis-3, the increase in sequential organ failure assessment (SOFA) as a clinical score for the identification of patients with sepsis and quickSOFA (qSOFA) for the identification of patients at risk of sepsis outside the intensive care unit (ICU) were introduced in 2016. However, their validity has been questioned, and their applicability in different settings and subgroups, such as hematological cancer patients, remains unclear. We therefore assessed the validity of SOFA, qSOFA, and the systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) criteria regarding the diagnosis of sepsis and the prediction of in-hospital mortality in a multicenter cohort of hematological cancer patients treated on ICU and non-ICU settings.

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Article Synopsis
  • Steroid-resistant acute graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) in the gastrointestinal tract leads to high morbidity and mortality, and while high-dose steroids are the first-line treatment, there isn't a widely accepted second-line option.
  • A study of 65 patients revealed that additional ileostomy surgery significantly improved overall survival (16 months vs. 4 months) and reduced both infectious and GVHD-associated mortality (40% vs. 77%).
  • The surgery was associated with reduced fecal volumes and alterations in immune cell populations, indicating a potential immune-modulating effect, suggesting that ileostomy could be a beneficial treatment for steroid-resistant acute GVHD, warranting further research.
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Levosimendan is an inodilator that promotes cardiac contractility primarily through calcium sensitization of cardiac troponin C and vasodilatation via opening of adenosine triphosphate-sensitive potassium (KATP) channels in vascular smooth muscle cells; the drug also exerts organ-protective effects through a similar effect on mitochondrial KATP channels. This pharmacological profile identifies levosimendan as a drug that may have applications in a wide range of critical illness situations encountered in intensive care unit medicine: hemodynamic support in cardiogenic or septic shock; weaning from mechanical ventilation or from extracorporeal membrane oxygenation; and in the context of cardiorenal syndrome. This review, authored by experts from 9 European countries (Austria, Belgium, Czech republic, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, and Switzerland), examines the clinical and experimental data for levosimendan in these situations and concludes that, in most instances, the evidence is encouraging, which is not the case with other cardioactive and vasoactive drugs routinely used in the intensive care unit.

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Despite significant advances in the treatment of complications requiring intensive care unit (ICU) admission, ICU mortality remains high for patients after allogeneic stem cell transplantation. We evaluated the role of thrombocytopenia and poor graft function in allogeneic stem cell recipients receiving ICU treatments along with established prognostic ICU markers in order to identify patients at risk for severe complications. At ICU admission, clinical and laboratory data of 108 allogeneic stem cell transplanted ICU patients were collected and retrospectively analyzed.

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For patients aged 60 years or older, the treatment of relapsed aggressive B-cell lymphomas remains challenging. The purpose of this retrospective analysis was to evaluate the results of the R-ICE (rituximab, ifosfamide, carboplatin, etoposide) protocol alone as compared to R-ICE followed by high-dose chemotherapy with autologous transplantation. The 3-year progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) rates in 17 patients receiving R-ICE without transplantation were 32% (95% confidence interval (CI): 8.

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