Background: Emergency department (ED) overcrowding poses a global challenge, particularly for critically ill patients requiring intensive care unit (ICU) admission. Although delays in ICU transfer increase mortality in critically ill populations, the optimal timing for septic shock remains uncertain. Methods: We conducted a target trial emulation using a prospective cohort of 815 septic shock patients from 19 Korean hospitals. Delayed ICU transfer was defined using restricted cubic splines. The primary outcome was in-hospital mortality. Multivariable logistic regression and inverse probability treatment weighting were used to adjust for confounders of age, sex, comorbidities, severity of illness, and mechanical ventilation use. Subgroup analyses were performed to assess the effect across patient characteristics. Results: The median time of ED-to-ICU transfer was 6.7 hours (interquartile range, 4.7–11.4), and only 7% of patients were transferred within 3 hours. ICU transfer within 3 hours was associated with significantly lower in-hospital mortality (odds ratio, 0.48; 95% CI, 0.24–0.94) compared to later transfers. Mortality risk increased with elapsing time up to 6 hours and then plateaued. The benefit of early ICU transfer was consistent across subgroups but was particularly pronounced in patients requiring extracorporeal membrane oxygenation or continuous renal replacement therapy (P for interaction=0.02). Conclusions Early ICU transfer within 3 hours significantly reduces mortality in patients with septic shock, with the greatest benefit observed in those requiring advanced organ support. These findings highlight the need for system-wide strategies to reduce ED boarding time and prioritize timely ICU admission for septic shock management.

Successful liberation from mechanical ventilation is one of the most crucial processes in critical care because it is the first step by which a respiratory failure patient begins to transition out of the intensive care unit and return to their own life. Therefore, when devising appropriate strategies for removing mechanical ventilation, it is essential to consider not only the individual experiences of healthcare professionals, but also scientific and systematic approaches. Recently, numerous studies have investigated methods and tools for identifying when mechanically ventilated patients are ready to breathe on their own. The Korean Society of Critical Care Medicine therefore provides these recommendations to clinicians about liberation from the ventilator. Methods: Meta-analyses and comprehensive syntheses were used to thoroughly review, compile, and summarize the complete body of relevant evidence. All studies were meticulously assessed using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) method, and the outcomes were presented succinctly as evidence profiles. Those evidence syntheses were discussed by a multidisciplinary committee of experts in mechanical ventilation, who then developed and approved recommendations. Results: Recommendations for nine PICO (population, intervention, comparator, and outcome) questions about ventilator liberation are presented in this document. This guideline includes seven conditional recommendations, one expert consensus recommendation, and one conditional deferred recommendation. Conclusions: We developed these clinical guidelines for mechanical ventilation liberation to provide meaningful recommendations. These guidelines reflect the best treatment for patients seeking liberation from mechanical ventilation.

Successful liberation from mechanical ventilation is one of the most crucial processes in critical care because it is the first step by which a respiratory failure patient begins to transition out of the intensive care unit and return to their own life. Therefore, when devising appropriate strategies for removing mechanical ventilation, it is essential to consider not only the individual experiences of healthcare professionals, but also scientific and systematic approaches. Recently, numerous studies have investigated methods and tools for identifying when mechanically ventilated patients are ready to breathe on their own. The Korean Society of Critical Care Medicine therefore provides these recommendations to clinicians about liberation from the ventilator. Methods: Meta-analyses and comprehensive syntheses were used to thoroughly review, compile, and summarize the complete body of relevant evidence. All studies were meticulously assessed using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) method, and the outcomes were presented succinctly as evidence profiles. Those evidence syntheses were discussed by a multidisciplinary committee of experts in mechanical ventilation, who then developed and approved recommendations. Results: Recommendations for nine PICO (population, intervention, comparator, and outcome) questions about ventilator liberation are presented in this document. This guideline includes seven conditional recommendations, one expert consensus recommendation, and one conditional deferred recommendation. Conclusions: We developed these clinical guidelines for mechanical ventilation liberation to provide meaningful recommendations. These guidelines reflect the best treatment for patients seeking liberation from mechanical ventilation.

Successful liberation from mechanical ventilation is one of the most crucial processes in critical care because it is the first step by which a respiratory failure patient begins to transition out of the intensive care unit and return to their own life. Therefore, when devising appropriate strategies for removing mechanical ventilation, it is essential to consider not only the individual experiences of healthcare professionals, but also scientific and systematic approaches. Recently, numerous studies have investigated methods and tools for identifying when mechanically ventilated patients are ready to breathe on their own. The Korean Society of Critical Care Medicine therefore provides these recommendations to clinicians about liberation from the ventilator. Methods: Meta-analyses and comprehensive syntheses were used to thoroughly review, compile, and summarize the complete body of relevant evidence. All studies were meticulously assessed using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) method, and the outcomes were presented succinctly as evidence profiles. Those evidence syntheses were discussed by a multidisciplinary committee of experts in mechanical ventilation, who then developed and approved recommendations. Results: Recommendations for nine PICO (population, intervention, comparator, and outcome) questions about ventilator liberation are presented in this document. This guideline includes seven conditional recommendations, one expert consensus recommendation, and one conditional deferred recommendation. Conclusions: We developed these clinical guidelines for mechanical ventilation liberation to provide meaningful recommendations. These guidelines reflect the best treatment for patients seeking liberation from mechanical ventilation.

Successful liberation from mechanical ventilation is one of the most crucial processes in critical care because it is the first step by which a respiratory failure patient begins to transition out of the intensive care unit and return to their own life. Therefore, when devising appropriate strategies for removing mechanical ventilation, it is essential to consider not only the individual experiences of healthcare professionals, but also scientific and systematic approaches. Recently, numerous studies have investigated methods and tools for identifying when mechanically ventilated patients are ready to breathe on their own. The Korean Society of Critical Care Medicine therefore provides these recommendations to clinicians about liberation from the ventilator. Methods: Meta-analyses and comprehensive syntheses were used to thoroughly review, compile, and summarize the complete body of relevant evidence. All studies were meticulously assessed using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) method, and the outcomes were presented succinctly as evidence profiles. Those evidence syntheses were discussed by a multidisciplinary committee of experts in mechanical ventilation, who then developed and approved recommendations. Results: Recommendations for nine PICO (population, intervention, comparator, and outcome) questions about ventilator liberation are presented in this document. This guideline includes seven conditional recommendations, one expert consensus recommendation, and one conditional deferred recommendation. Conclusions: We developed these clinical guidelines for mechanical ventilation liberation to provide meaningful recommendations. These guidelines reflect the best treatment for patients seeking liberation from mechanical ventilation.

Objectives: Sepsis is a leading global cause of mortality, and predicting its outcomes is vital for improving patient care. This study explored the capabilities of ChatGPT, a state-of-the-art natural language processing model, in predicting in-hospital mortality for sepsis patients. Methods: This study utilized data from the Korean Sepsis Alliance (KSA) database, collected between 2019 and 2021, focusing on adult intensive care unit (ICU) patients and aiming to determine whether ChatGPT could predict all-cause mortality after ICU admission at 7 and 30 days. Structured prompts enabled ChatGPT to engage in in-context learning, with the number of patient examples varying from zero to six. The predictive capabilities of ChatGPT-3.5-turbo and ChatGPT-4 were then compared against a gradient boosting model (GBM) using various performance metrics. Results: From the KSA database, 4,786 patients formed the 7-day mortality prediction dataset, of whom 718 died, and 4,025 patients formed the 30-day dataset, with 1,368 deaths. Age and clinical markers (e.g., Sequential Organ Failure Assessment score and lactic acid levels) showed significant differences between survivors and non-survivors in both datasets. For 7-day mortality predictions, the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC) was 0.70–0.83 for GPT-4, 0.51–0.70 for GPT-3.5, and 0.79 for GBM. The AUROC for 30-day mortality was 0.51–0.59 for GPT-4, 0.47–0.57 for GPT-3.5, and 0.76 for GBM. Zero-shot predictions using GPT-4 for mortality from ICU admission to day 30 showed AUROCs from the mid-0.60s to 0.75 for GPT-4 and mainly from 0.47 to 0.63 for GPT-3.5. Conclusions GPT-4 demonstrated potential in predicting short-term in-hospital mortality, although its performance varied across different evaluation metrics.

The process of cancer metastasis is dependent on the cancer cells’ capacity to detach from the primary tumor, endure in a suspended state, and establish colonies in other locations.Anchorage dependence, which refers to the cells’ reliance on attachment to the extracellular matrix (ECM), is a critical determinant of cellular shape, dynamics, behavior, and, ultimately, cell fate in nonmalignant and cancer cells. Anchorage-independent growth is a characteristic feature of cells resistant to anoikis, a programmed cell death process triggered by detachment from the ECM. This ability to grow and survive without attachment to a substrate is a crucial stage in the progression of metastasis. The recently discovered phenomenon named “adherent-to-suspension transition (AST)” alters the requirement for anchoring and enhances survival in a suspended state. AST is controlled by four transcription factors (IKAROS family zinc finger 1, nuclear factor erythroid 2, BTG anti-proliferation factor 2, and interferon regulatory factor 8) and can detach cells without undergoing the typical epithelialmesenchymal transition. Notably, AST factors are highly expressed in circulating tumor cells compared to their attached counterparts, indicating their crucial role in the spread of cancer.Crucially, the suppression of AST substantially reduces metastasis while sparing primary tumors. These findings open up possibilities for developing targeted therapies that inhibit metastasis and emphasize the importance of AST, leading to a fundamental change in our comprehension of how cancer spreads.

Background: Successful liberation from mechanical ventilation is one of the most crucial processes in critical care, because it is the first step through which a respiratory failure patient begins to transition out of the intensive care unit, and return to normal life. Therefore, when devising appropriate strategies for removing mechanical ventilation, it is essential to consider scientific and systematic approaches, as well as the individual experiences of healthcare professionals. Recently, numerous studies have investigated methods and tools to identify when mechanically ventilated patients are ready to breathe on their own. The Korean Society of Critical Care Medicine therefore provides these recommendations to clinicians for liberation from the ventilator. Methods: Meta-analyses and comprehensive syntheses were used to thoroughly review, compile, and summarize the complete body of relevant evidence. All studies were meticulously assessed using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) method, and the outcomes were presented succinctly as evidence profiles. These evidence syntheses were discussed by a multidisciplinary committee of experts in mechanical ventilation, who then developed and approved the recommendations. Results: Recommendations for nine questions on ventilator liberation about Population, Intervention, Comparator, and Outcome (PICO) are presented in this document. This guideline presents seven conditional recommendations, one expert consensus recommendation, and one conditional deferred recommendation. Conclusion We developed these clinical guidelines for mechanical ventilation liberation to provide meaningful recommendations. These guidelines reflect the best treatment for patients seeking liberation from mechanical ventilation.

An adult castrated male dog was presented with persistent hematochezia. Digital rectal examination and endoscopy found multiple colorectal masses. Complete blood count and serum biochemical results were within the reference interval. Fine needle aspirate of the masses indicated a diagnosis of inflamed polyps with a primary differential of malignancy. Histopathologic examination using endoscopy-guided incisional biopsy of the masses revealed an inflamed neoplasm with ossification. A colectomy was performed to remove the tumor. Subsequent histopathologic examination of the surgically resected masses resulted in a diagnosis of colorectal carcinoma in situ (CiS) with immune infiltrates, which were subject to immunohistochemical and flow cytometric immunophenotyping. The immunohistochemistry confirmed intraepithelial CD3 + T cells within CiS. The flow cytometric analysis indicated tumor-infiltrating CD4 + T, CD8 + T, and CD11b + myeloid subsets. The flow cytometric analysis of circulating and tumor-infiltrating leukocytes demonstrated a preferential expansion of CD25 + FOXP3 + regulatory T cells within CiS. To the author’s knowledge, this is the first report to show clinical evidence emphasizing the immunogenicity and immune-suppressive environment of canine colorectal CiS. Our case will be valuable in providing a rationale for basic research that dissects the immune environment for canine colorectal cancers for the future development of cancer immunotherapy.

Background: Administration of adequate antibiotics is crucial for better outcomes in sepsis. Because no uniform tool can accurately assess the risk of multidrug-resistant (MDR) pathogens, a local antibiogram is necessary. We aimed to describe the antibiogram of MDR bacteria based on locations of sepsis onset in South Korea. Methods: We performed a prospective observational study of adult patients diagnosed with sepsis according to Sepsis-3 from 19 institutions (13 tertiary referral and 6 universityaffiliated general hospitals) in South Korea. Patients were divided into four groups based on the respective location of sepsis onset: community, nursing home, long-term-care hospital, and hospital. Along with the antibiogram, risk factors of MDR bacteria and drug-bug match of empirical antibiotics were analyzed. Results: MDR bacteria were detected in 1,596 (22.7%) of 7,024 patients with gram-negative predominance. MDR gram-negative bacteria were more commonly detected in long-termcare hospital- (30.4%) and nursing home-acquired (26.3%) sepsis, whereas MDR grampositive bacteria were more prevalent in hospital-acquired (10.9%) sepsis. Such findings were consistent regardless of the location and tier of hospitals throughout South Korea. Patients with long-term-care hospital-acquired sepsis had the highest risk of MDR pathogen, which was even higher than those with hospital-acquired sepsis (adjusted odds ratio, 1.42; 95% confidence interval, 1.15–1.75) after adjustment of risk factors. The drug-bug match was lowest in patients with long-term-care hospital-acquired sepsis (66.8%). Conclusion Gram-negative MDR bacteria were more common in nursing home- and long-term-care hospital-acquired sepsis, whereas gram-positive MDR bacteria were more common in hospital-acquired settings in South Korea. Patients with long-term-care hospitalacquired sepsis had the highest the risk of MDR bacteria but lowest drug-bug match of initial antibiotics. We suggest that initial antibiotics be carefully selected according to the onset location in each patient.