Albumin: don't confuse us with the facts

BMJ 1998;317:829-830 ( 26 September )

Editorials

Albumin: don't confuse us with the facts

Rather than fulminating, seek to answer the questions raised

Letters p 882

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Goodness, what a reaction. You would think that the Cochrane Injuries Group had really gone too far with its systematic reviewsof the outcomes in patients treated with colloid solutions and human albumin. ¹ ² Worse, the BMJ has colluded in publicisingthis dangerously subversive material. One couldn't miss the incandescentletters that these rather routine, workmanlike reviews have elicited(p 882). ³ ⁴ It's as though they had desecrated Osler's grave.

So what is going on here? Scepticism about most uses of albumin is not new⁵ and is reflected in clinical guidance in theUnited Kingdom.⁶ The new factor is that a group that is expertin the business of finding and sifting clinical evidence has revisited this aspect of the crystalloid v colloid argument that has beengrumbling on since the Vietnam war. The authors are not clinicalexperts in emergency medicine, burns, or intensive care and don'tclaim to be. All . . . [Full text of this article]

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Data, data, data. Give me peace and knowledge
BMJ 1998 317: 0. [Full Text]

Human albumin administration in critically ill patients: Andy Petros, Margrid Schindler, Christine Pierce, Steven Jacobe, Quen Mok, Mark R Nel, Simon Nadel, Steven Marriage, Claudine De Munter, Joseph Britto, Parviz Habibi, Michael Levin, M Kaag, F A N Zoetmulder, F Andrew I Riordan, Andrew Williams, Alistair P J Thomson, Neil Soni, Neville W Goodman, R J Beale, D L A Wyncoll, A McLuckie, J D Frame, N Moiemem, Iain Chalmers, P G Lawler, G A Morgan, K H Shwe, M Bhavnani, and Ian Roberts
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