Vanderbilt University Medical Center is encouraging its medical providers to stop using saline as intravenous fluid therapy for most patients, a change provoked by two companion landmark studies released Feb. 27 that are anticipated to improve survival and decrease kidney complications.

A clinical trial of an intervention for sepsis in patients in Zambia, led by Vanderbilt investigators, topped the list of 2017 trials featured by the website The Bottom Line.

Acetaminophen may offer a simple treatment to prevent tissue injury following lung transplant, Vanderbilt researchers have discovered.

Investigators in the Division of Allergy, Pulmonary and Critical Care have launched a pilot study to see if patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) can tolerate the addition of a commonly used antiviral drug to standard IPF treatments. The research team believes the drug may ultimately help slow progression of the chronic and progressive disease or reverse its course.

New findings from Vanderbilt suggest that blocking the migration of cells involved in asthma may represent a new approach for treating the respiratory condition.

In childhood, asthma is more common in boys than girls. But around the time of puberty, that picture reverses. By mid-life women are twice as likely as men to have asthma.

RSV infection reduces the risk of infection with human rhinovirus, which could have implications for vaccine development and prevention strategies for viral respiratory tract infections in infants.