Abstract
Very often, the use of cortisone in pleural pathology is based on a few anecdotal cases, while our therapeutic choices should always be guided by the most trustworthy scientific literature. To address the problem of the use of cortisone in a rational way, it is therefore worth taking a look at the authoritative scientific literature, the most important Guidelines and the Cochrane Library. The only study in the literature to evaluate the efficacy of systemic corticosteroids in parapneumonic effusions was carried out in the paediatric field, but the limit of this study is that it does not include complicated pleural effusion and empyema; for the adult patient, there are no clinical studies that demonstrate the usefulness of cortisone. In the Cochrane review, nothing is found in the field of infectious pleural effusion about the use of cortisone. The Cochrane review does not provide evidence to recommend the use of corticosteroids in TB pleurisy. Neither the Nice Guidelines 2016 nor the Index TB 2016 recommends cortisone in TB pleurisy.
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Casalini, A.G. (2023). Use of Cortisone in Pleural Pathology. In: Casalini, A.G. (eds) Practical Manual of Pleural Pathology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-20312-1_19
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