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Tocilizumab : a treatment alternative in COVID-19 pneumonia
Patients with severe COVID-19 pneumonia often need to be mechanically intubated and have an increased mortality risk. Tocilizumab, a drug used against the cytokine storm underlying this clinical condition, has shown positive effects in clinical trials.
A scientist’s opinion : Interview with Prof Cristina Mussini about covid-19 treatment
Interview with Professor Cristina Mussini, Head of the Department of Infectious Diseases and Tropical Medicine at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia in Italy and member of the European AIDS Clinical Society. She has been actively involved in various recent studies on the clinical use of tocilizumab in patients with COVID-19 pneumonia. First a ...
A scientist’s opinion : Interview with Dr Andrew Ip about covid-19 treatment
Interview with Dr Andrew Ip, a specialist in hematology/oncology at the John Theurer Cancer Center at Hackensack University Medical Center, USA, who has been involved in research on tocilizumab use in COVID-19 patients. Why did you choose tocilizumab to treat patients with COVID-19 pneumonia? Andrew Ip: Tocilizumab is a monoclonal antibody that inhibits the interleukin-6 ...
A scientist’s opinion : Interview with Dr Juan Victor San-Martin Lopez about covid-19 treatment
Interview with Dr Juan Victor San-Martín López, a physician specialising in infectious diseases and a member of the task force coordinating responses to the leishmaniasis outbreak in 2011 and to COVID-19 at the Hospital Universitario de Fuenlabrada, Spain. He reports on his experience with tocilizumab use in COVID-19 patients. What is the so-called cytokine storm? ...
The key role of antivirals in COVID-19 treatment (remdesivir)
A few weeks after the SARS-CoV-2 was identified by Chinese researchers as the cause of ‘COVID-19’, an antiviral called remdesivir, originally used during the 2014 Ebola outbreak, came into play as the first available option to treat patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Even if the approval process for remdesivir caused some controversy, experts consider the combined use of antivirals and other drugs a promising solution for treatment of Covid-19.
A scientist’s opinion : Interview with Prof Martijn van Hemert about covid-19 treatment
Interview with Martijn van Hemert, Associate professor and Principal Investigator in molecular virology and antiviral strategies at the Leiden University Medical Center. In recent years, his group has mainly been studying the Chikungunya and Zika viruses, but in the past he has also studied SARS-CoV. Since February 2020, he has shifted his focus to research ...
A scientist’s opinion : Interview with Dr Juan Pablo Horcajada about covid-19 treatment
Interview with Juan Pablo Horcajada, MD. is Head of the Department of Infectious Diseases and General Coordinator of the COVID-19 Service at the Hospital del Mar, Barcelona. Remdesivir is the first drug approved by the EMA to be used as part of the treatment of COVID-19 patients. How’s the use of this antiviral in your ...
Dexamethasone : the first life-saving drug for COVID-19 patients
Clinical trials make it possible to evaluate whether a treatment improves outcomes. Developing a hypothesis, for example if treatment A is better than standard treatment B, clinical trials enable understanding of the role of an intervention in improving patient care. In the current search for a successful treatment against COVID-19, ongoing multiple clinical trials have started to make a difference, such as the Recovery clinical trial on dexamethasone, which has given a definitive verdict on the use of corticosteroids during COVID-19.