The European Congress of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases is one of the largest annual global gatherings of experts focused on a single topic. This year it has rebranded, emerging as the European Society for Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (ESCMID) Global congress. Here, Gerry Hughes reports on the key themes and highlights from the congress such as AI, climate change and AMR. With hundreds of invited speakers, the ESCMID Global 2024 gathering in Barcelona, Spain (27-30 April), welcomed approximately 16,000 delegates for five days of knowledge exchange, collaboration ..read more

Education is the gateway to success. By attending conferences and arming ourselves with the facts, we can make informed decisions in our ongoing pharmacy practice, says Tiene Bauters PharmD PhD, Pharmacy Department, Ghent University Hospital, Belgium, on her return from EBMT 2024. In today’s interconnected world, national and international conferences are pivotal in informing us of innovations and significant developments in patient care and clinical practice. Conferences also help us connect with colleagues worldwide in an environment where experts, stakeholders, policymakers and even patient ..read more

Healthcare professionals involved in the prescribing of montelukast as an oral add-on therapy for the treatment of asthma in patients aged six months or older should be alert to serious behaviour and neuropsychiatric reactions associated with the treatment, according to a new drug safety update. This reminder about montelukast from the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) comes after continued Yellow Card reports of a range of neuropsychiatric reactions such as sleep disorders, hallucinations, anxiety and depression, and changes in behaviour and mood. A review of evidence ..read more

Exhaled breath analysis shows promise as a non-invasive approach for the therapeutic monitoring of antibiotics, a proof-of-concept study has found. At the recent ESCMID Global Congress Barcelona, Spain (27-30 April), Swiss researchers presented the findings from the prospective, single-centre study of 10 adult hospitalised patients (median age 63 years, 54.5% female) who received intravenous antibiotic treatment in 2022 or 2023. For patients with severe infections or in intensive care, therapeutic drug monitoring allowed clinicians to account for differences in how individuals metabolise drugs ..read more

Here at Hospital Pharmacy Europe, we provide hospital pharmacists with inspirational examples of best practice, and that includes sharing insights into innovative projects being launched across the UK and Europe to support the profession and improve patient care. If you’re working on a new and exciting way to transform hospital pharmacy practice and would like to share it with colleagues, we want to hear from you. We’re looking for pilot projects, applied research and case studies covering all areas of professional expertise including: Medicines optimisation Patient safety Person-centred care ..read more

Patients with allergic rhinitis who take a liquid sublingual allergen immunotherapy (SLIT-liquid) have a significant reduction in the risk of asthma onset or worsening for up to eight years compared with patients taking symptomatic allergic rhinitis therapies alone, a large real-world study has found. Allergic rhinitis affects 400 million people worldwide, with one third of these patients also having allergic asthma, the French researchers wrote in The Lancet Regional Health – Europe. Current allergic rhinitis management strategies aim to control symptoms and reduce inflammation, with oral or ..read more

The cystic fibrosis (CF) medication ivacaftor (brand name Kalydeco) is safe and effective in infants aged four weeks and over, paving the way for earlier initiation of therapy for newborns diagnosed with the condition, a phase 3 open-label study has found. Ivacaftor, a cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) modulator therapy, was originally approved for use in adults but has since been shown to be safe and efficacious in children as young as four months. The therapy increases channel gating activity at the cell surface in patients with CTFR gating mutations. These mutations ..read more

Cholesterol-lowering drugs are less frequently prescribed to women compared to men, despite European Society of Cardiology (ESC) guidelines recommending statins for all patients with chronic coronary syndrome, new research has revealed. Recommendations for target levels of low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol are the same for women and men, but previous studies have shown that women are less likely to meet these target levels. This new retrospective observational study, presented at the recent ESC Preventive Cardiology 2024 congress, considered whether women and men actually receive the s ..read more

Efanesoctocog alfa (brand name Altuvoct) has been granted a positive opinion by the European Medicines Agency’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) for the treatment and prevention of bleeds and perioperative prophylaxis in haemophilia A, its manufacturer Sobi has announced. The once-weekly and high-sustained factor VIII replacement therapy is recommended for patients of all ages and any disease severity. It is the only therapy that has been shown to break through the von Willebrand factor ceiling, which imposes a half-life limitation on current factor VIII therapies, said So ..read more

This paper provides case study examples and personal accounts from specialist mental health pharmacists who played key roles in an NHS England-sponsored psychotropic medication improvement programme. The programme for providers of in-patient mental health services for children and young people enabled professionals and recipients of the services to actively participate in all aspects of improving the use of psychotropic medication. The 2019 NHS Long Term Plan1 set out the priorities for expanding children and young people’s mental health services over 10 years. The subsequent NHS Mental Health ..read more