Safety of rapid rituximab infusion in adult cancer patients: A systematic review

The purpose of this study is to critically appraise, synthesize and present the best available evidence related to the safety of rapid rituximab infusion in adult non-Hodgkin lymphoma and chronic lymphocytic leukaemia patients. Data are from published and unpublished studies from electronic databases, grey literature and reference lists. The studies that met the inclusion criteria were critically appraised by two independent reviewers for methodological validity using standardized critical appraisal instruments. Proportional meta-analysis based on DerSimonian–Laird weights using a random effects model was used for statistical pooling through Stats Direct. Heterogeneity is assessed using Cochran Q. When statistical pooling is not possible, the findings were presented in narrative summary. Rapid rituximab infusion is safe for non-Hodgkin lymphoma patients at a 90 min regimen. However, there is insufficient evidence to support rapid rituximab infusions for chronic lymphocytic leukaemia patients.Dora SP Lang, Christina Hagger, Alan Pearso

Interval breast cancers in the ‘screening with tomosynthesis or standard mammography’ (STORM) population-based trial

The prospective ‘screening with tomosynthesis or standard mammography’ (STORM) trial recruited women participating in biennial breast screening in Italy (2011–2012), and compared sequential screen-readings based on 2D-mammography alone or based on tomosynthesis (integrated 2D/3D-mammography). The STORM trial showed that tomosynthesis screen-reading significantly increased breast cancer detection compared to 2D-mammography alone. The present study completes reporting of the trial by examining interval breast cancers ascertained at two year follow-up

Validity of intraoperative gross examination of myometrial invasion in patients with endometrial cancer: a meta-analysis

Objective. The current recommended endometrial cancer surgical treatment is abdominal extrafascial total hysterectomy with bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy followed by pelvic lymphadenectomy if &gt;50% myometrial invasion is estimated by intraoperative gross examination (IGE). This meta-analysis aims to quantify evidence regarding the validity/predictive value of IGE staging compared with final histology. Design. Meta-analysis of studies published until October 2011. Setting. Systematic search, according to PRISMA guidelines, of the six major medical literature databases Medline, Scopus, EMBASE, Google Scholar, Ovid, Cochrane. Population. Sixteen eligible studies including 2567 endometrial cancer patients. Methods. Pooled sensitivity/specificity, accuracy, negative/positive predictive value (NPV/PPV) and diagnostic odds ratio (DOR) of IGE were calculated and the summary receiver operator characteristic (sROC) curve was constructed. A meta-regression analysis was used to explore the role of potential modifiers of sensitivity and specificity. Main outcome measures. Pooled diagnostic measures of IGE indices. Results. Sixteen studies (15 retrospective, one prospective) meeting the inclusion criteria were qualitatively analyzed. Pooled IGE estimates were: sensitivity = 0.75 (95%CI: 0.720.78), specificity = 0.92 (95%CI 0.900.94), accuracy = 0.87 (95%CI 0.860.88), NPV = 0.89 (95%CI 0.870.92), PPV = 0.80 (95%CI 0.760.84) and DOR = 36.9 (95%CI 28.747.4). No significant modifiers were identified for sensitivity or specificity. Conclusions. The synthesized measures presented here for the first time showed that accuracy, sensitivity and specificity of IGE were 87, 75 and 92%, respectively, which indicates that IGE is useful for estimating depth of myometrial invasion and staging of endometrial cancer in clinical practice. The degree to which the relatively low values of some of its performance indicators could be improved remains to be elucidated in order for the values to be comparable with those from frozen section biopsies.</p