Last Week’s Hot Topic on Pulmonary Hypertension

Last week’s hot topic on pulmonary hypertension was PAH in Lupus Patients Needs Close Monitoring and Earlier Treatment written by Magdalena Kegel.

This article is about how patients with systemic lupus erythematosus who develop pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) have a poorer prognosis, according to a review from the Peking Union Medical College & Chinese Academy of Medical Science, which strongly recommended clinicians pay attention to the simultaneous presence of these conditions, as early diagnosis and management might improve survival.

Interestingly, the study identified a number of factors that could be used to predict a worse prognosis. Higher mean pulmonary arterial pressure and vascular resistance, lower six-minute walking distance scores, higher brain natriuretic peptide (BNP), and higher NT-proBNP levels were all related to poorer survival rates.

WHO functional classes III and IV were associated with poor survival in several of the included studies, and were confirmed as a risk factor in the present analysis. The severity of lupus was not found to be predictive of survival.

Read the latest news on pulmonary hypertension: http://bit.ly/1K4oewk