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Psychoactive drugs, including illicit drugs, are associated with an increased rate of cardiovascular events. The prevalence and outcome of patients using these drugs at the time of admission to an intensive cardiac care unit is unknown.To assess the prevalence of psychoactive drugs detected in consecutive patients hospitalized in an intensive cardiac care unit for an acute cardiovascular event.This is a nationwide prospective multicentre study, involving 39 centres throughout France, including all consecutive patients hospitalized in an intensive cardiac care unit within 2weeks. Psychoactive drug use will be assessed systematically by urine drug assay within 2hours of intensive cardiac care unit admission, to detect illicit (cannabinoids, cocaine, amphetamines, ecstasy, heroin and other opioids) and non-illicit (barbiturates, benzodiazepines, tricyclic antidepressants, methadone and buprenorphine) psychoactive drugs. Smoking will be investigated systematically by exhaled carbon monoxide measurement, and alcohol consumption using a standardized questionnaire. In-hospital major adverse events, including death, resuscitated cardiac arrest and cardiogenic shock, will be recorded. After discharge, all-cause death and major adverse cardiovascular events will be recorded systematically and adjudicated at 12months of follow-up.The primary outcome will be the prevalence of psychoactive drugs detected by systematic screening among all patients hospitalized in an intensive cardiac care unit. The in-hospital major adverse events will be analysed according to the presence or absence of detected psychoactive drugs. Subgroup analysis stratified by initial clinical presentation and type of psychoactive drug will be performed.This is the first prospective multicentre study to assess the prevalence of psychoactive drugs detected by systematic screening in consecutive patients hospitalized for acute cardiovascular events.

Background An accurate estimation of the duration of atrial fibrillation is critical for its safe management. Recent studies suggested that copeptin, carbohydrate antigen-125, galectin-3 and growth differentiation factor-15 are increased in atrial fibrillation. We examined the ability of these markers to identify patients presenting with atrial fibrillation of ≤48 versus >48 h duration. Methods Retrospective analysis of a prospective study that included patients with atrial fibrillation of known duration. Results A total of 98 patients were analysed, 47 with atrial fibrillation ≤48 h and 51 with >48 h. In patients presenting with atrial fibrillation of ≤48 versus >48 h duration, the mean carbohydrate antigen-125 concentration was 16.9 ± 12.5 versus 30.9 ± 36.3 U/mL ( P = 0.01), and growth differentiation factor-15 concentration was 1320 ± 889 versus 2608 ±2163 pg/mL ( P Conclusion The plasma concentrations of carbohydrate antigen-125, growth differentiation factor-15 and copeptin, but not galectin-3, are higher in patients presenting with atrial fibrillation of >48 h duration than in those with atrial fibrillation ≤48 h. The ability to discriminate recent atrial fibrillation offered by carbohydrate antigen-125 and growth differentiation factor-15 seems high.

Background Natriuretic peptides (NPs) are widely used in the diagnosis and risk stratification of heart failure (HF).NPs may have a reduced discriminative ability in the subgroup of elderly patients. Methods We examined all biological tests performed from February 2010 to August 2015 in two districts in the French Brittany. We report the “real-world” use of N-terminal pro-B-type natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP) in an elderly population and examine the measured concentration and potential impact of the cut-off value's selection. Results From a total of 3,606,432 tests ordered in 557,650 adult patients, 56,653 included at least one NT-proBNP measurement. NT-proBNP measurements gradually increased by 10-y age categories up to 80–90 y, and 39,828 (70.3%) of all measurements have been done in patients ≥75y. NT-proBNP concentrations increased with advanced age (Pearson's correlation coefficient: 0.2; p75y (p Conclusion Among a very large cohort, we observed that NT-proBNP is increasingly measured in elderly patients. NT-proBNP concentrations increase with age, and the selection of the threshold value markedly impacts the proportion of “low” versus “high” results. Funding Acknowledgement Type of funding sources: Private company. Main funding source(s): Roche Diagnostics Proportion (in %) of low NT-proBNP

Background Natriuretic peptides have broad indications during heart failure and the detection of left ventricular dysfunction in high-risk patients. They can also be used for the diagnosis/management of other cardiac diseases. However, very little is known regarding their use in routine practice. Methods We examined all biological tests performed from February 2010 to August 2015 in two districts from the French Brittany, covering 13,653 km2 and including 22,265 physicians. We report the settings and conditions of N-terminal pro-B-type natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP) measurements (the only locally natriuretic peptide available). Results From a total of 3,606,432 tests requested in 557,650 adult (older than 20 years) patients, only 56,653 (1.6%) included at least one NT-proBNP measurement. NT-proBNP measurements gradually increased, from 9188 in 2011 to 12,938 in 2014 ( P Conclusion Among a very large cohort, we observed that natriuretic peptides remain largely undermeasured. NT-proBNP is mostly measured in elderly patients, and its interpretation may be hazardous in up to 16% of all individuals because no measurement of creatinine was associated to NT-proBNP.

The presence of a normal atrial electrical activity together with the absence of mechanical atrial activity has been reported after successful cardioversion and is named atrial stunning. In this observation, we report the existence of left but not right atrial stunning.

Background Intensivists’ clinical decision making pursues two main goals for patients: to decrease mortality and to improve quality of life and functional status in survivors. Patient-important outcomes are gaining wide acceptance in most fields of clinical research. We sought to systematically review how well patient-important outcomes are reported in published randomized controlled trials (RCTs) in critically ill patients. Methods Literature search was conducted to identify eligible trials indexed from January to December 2013. Articles were eligible if they reported an RCT involving critically ill adult patients. We excluded phase II, pilot and physiological crossover studies. We assessed study characteristics. All primary and secondary outcomes were collected, described and classified using six categories of outcomes including patient-important outcomes (involving mortality at any time on the one hand and quality of life, functional/cognitive/neurological outcomes assessed after ICU discharge on the other). Results Of the 716 articles retrieved in 2013, 112 RCTs met the inclusion criteria. Most common topics were mechanical ventilation (27%), sepsis (19%) and nutrition (17%). Among the 112 primary outcomes, 27 (24%) were patient-important outcomes (mainly mortality, 21/27) but only six (5%) were patient-important outcomes besides mortality assessed after ICU discharge (functional disability = 4; quality of life = 2). Among the 598 secondary outcomes, 133 (22%) were patient-important outcomes (mainly mortality, 92/133) but only 41 (7%) were patient-important outcomes besides mortality assessed after ICU discharge (quality of life = 20, functional disability = 14; neurological/cognitive performance = 5; handicap = 1; post-traumatic stress = 1). Seventy-three RCTs (65%) reported at least one patient-important outcome but only 11 (10%) reported at least one patient-important outcome besides mortality assessed after ICU discharge. Conclusion Patient-important outcomes are rarely primary outcomes in RCTs in critically ill patients published in 2013. Among them, mortality accounted for the majority. We promote the use of patient-important outcomes in critical care trials. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13613-017-0243-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Additional file 1. Terms used for the literature search strategy.