There is a pressing need for effective interventions that can support healthcare workers and caregivers in the challenging yet crucial task of disclosing the HIV status to infected children and adolescents. Previously, we developed and tested a successful disclosure intervention called Sankofa in Ghana. In an ongoing 5-year follow-up study, Sankofa 2, we aim to build on the successful Sankofa trial by testing the intervention on a larger scale.

This study is a pragmatic, stepped-wedge cluster randomised trial.

It is being conducted in 12 HIV paediatric clinics in Ghana to examine the effectiveness, health benefits, cost and implementation of the Sankofa intervention. Caregiver–child dyads (n=700) will be enrolled. Evaluation of effectiveness, health benefits, cost and implementation of the Paediatric HIV disclosure intervention, Sankofa 2, is posed to offer valuable insights for scale-up and sustainability.

Ethical clearance has been obtained from the Ghana Health Service Ethics Review Committee, the University of Ghana Ethical and Protocol Review Committee, the Committee on Human Research Publication and Ethics of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, the Johns Hopkins Medicine Institutional Review Board and the Yale School of Medicine Human Investigation Committee. The clinical trial was registered on ClinicalTrials.gov on 5 March 2021. All caregiver participants are required to provide written informed consent and the children assent before enrolment. If either the child or caregiver says no to the study, the dyad is not eligible for the study. No study-related procedures are performed until consent is obtained. The results of the trial will be added on ClinicalTrials.gov, published in peer-reviewed journals and presented at international conferences.

NCT04791865.

Nintedanib is approved for the treatment of interstitial lung disease (ILD) with progressive pulmonary fibrosis (PPF). Real-life data on nintedanib treatment for this indication and on the combined use of antifibrotic and immunomodulatory drugs are limited. This study was aimed to collect detailed real-life data from all patients with non-idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) PPF at the Hospital District of Helsinki and Uusimaa to identify the gap between patients included in randomised controlled trials and real-life patients.

This retrospective, real-life study characterised all patients with non-IPF PPF diagnosed and treated at the Hospital District of Helsinki and Uusimaa.

Thirty-one patients were identified as having non-IPF fibrotic ILD and meeting the PPF criteria in 2022 and 2023.

The most common diagnosis was connective tissue disease–ILDs, with 13 patients (42%), followed by fibrotic idiopathic non-specific interstitial pneumonia (iNSIP), with 10 (32%) patients. The most common radiological pattern was NSIP in 18 (58%) patients.

Among the 30 patients treated with nintedanib, six (20%) had to permanently discontinue treatment owing to side effects. Of the 19 patients who continued to receive nintedanib at the end of the follow-up period and for whom the dose was known, 9 (47%) continued to receive nintedanib at the full dose (150 mg two times per day) and 10 (53%) at the reduced dose (100 mg two times per day). Twenty-seven (87%) patients received immunomodulatory treatment at the time of PPF.

In our cohort, the underlying diagnoses and immunomodulatory treatments received significantly differed from those in the phase III licensing trial. More patients received nintedanib at a reduced dose than at a full dose, despite limited evidence of its efficacy and effectiveness. This highlights the large gap in evidence and the need for additional real-world data.

Endovascular aortic aneurysm repair (EVAR) requires long-term surveillance to detect and treat postoperative complications. However, prediction models to optimise follow-up strategies are still lacking. The primary objective of this study is to develop predictive models of post-operative outcomes following elective EVAR using Artificial Intelligence (AI)-driven analysis. The secondary objective is to investigate morphological aortic changes following EVAR.

This international, multicentre, observational study will retrospectively include 500 patients who underwent elective EVAR. Primary outcomes are EVAR postoperative complications including deaths, re-interventions, endoleaks, limb occlusion and stent-graft migration occurring within 1 year and at mid-term follow-up (1 to 3 years). Secondary outcomes are aortic anatomical changes. Morphological changes following EVAR will be analysed and compared based on preoperative and postoperative CT angiography (CTA) images (within 1 to 12 months, and at the last follow-up) using the AI-based software PRAEVAorta 2 (Nurea). Deep learning algorithms will be applied to stratify the risk of postoperative outcomes into low or high-risk categories. The training and testing dataset will be respectively composed of 70% and 30% of the cohort.

The study protocol is designed to ensure that the sponsor and the investigators comply with the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki and the ICH E6 good clinical practice guideline. The study has been approved by the ethics committee of the University Hospital of Patras (Patras, Greece) under the number 492/05.12.2024. The results of the study will be presented at relevant national and international conferences and submitted for publication to peer-review journals.