When critically ill patients receive a donor organ, they have to take immune-suppressing medication for the rest of their lives. However, these immunosuppressants can also prevent a vaccine from triggering the desired response in the patient’s immune system. Professor of Immunology Martina Sester and her team have recently shown that despite the weakened immune response in organ transplant recipients, the different Covid-19 vaccines mobilize the immune defences in these individuals in different ways and that the best immune response is achieved when these vaccines are used in combination.

For many generations, violent conflicts, oppression, persecution and war have characterized people´s lives in the Middle East. Many people are severely mentally traumatized. Professor Jan Ilhan Kizilhan and other psychotherapists wrote the "Trauma Workbook" - to help the helpers to provide the appropriate treatment. The book appeared in three versions: Farsi, English, German.

Numerous attempts to create a uniform classification system for ventilation modes have been unsuccessful. With the new brochure "Understanding and comparing modes of ventilation" Dres. Peter Kremeier and Christian Woll succeeded. To define a useful system of classification, the authors have settled on five categories:

"Despite the perceived benefits of transfusion, research has indicated that exposure of allogeneic blood is associated with increased risks of morbidity and mortality following cardiac surgery. Adverse postoperative clinical outcomes - such as renal failure, stroke, pulmonary dysfunction and infections - have been reported. While these complications have been linked to as few as 1-2 units of donor RBCs, the impact on patient outcome is believed to be dose-dependent. Additionally, the transfusion consequences may extend beyond hosptalization and influence long-term survival," David C. Fitzgerald and Joseph J. Sistino (Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston/USA) report in the new textbook "Extracorporeal Circulation in Theory and Practice".

A new study from Tel Aviv University and the Weizmann Institute revealed that over the last 20,000-50,000 years birds have undergone a major extinction event, inflicted chiefly by humans, which caused the disappearance of about 10%-20% of all avian species. According to the researchers, the vast majority of the extinct species shared several features: they were large, they lived on islands, and many of them were flightless.

GENEVA – UN human rights experts* said today they were extremely alarmed by reports of alleged ‘organ harvesting’ targeting minorities, including Falun Gong practitioners, Uyghurs, Tibetans, Muslims and Christians, in detention in China.

Central venous (CV) and arterial catheters present many risks compared to peripheral indwelling

catheters in case of improper handling, both in terms of placement and non-hygienic use. Dr. Peter Kremeier and colleagues explain the placement and hygienic use of such catheters (in the new manual "Ventilation and intensive care therapy for COVID19").

"The surgical treatment of aneurysms or dissections of the ascending aorta requires the use of Extracorporeal Circulation. During surgery of the aortic arch special perfusion techniques are required for cerebral protection (deep hypothermia with circulatory arrest, selective cerebral perfusion)", Dr. Dirk Troitzsch and colleagues report in the new textbook "Extracorporeal Circulation".

"Action is often conceived of as a way to change the world, and humans are perceived of as ingenious engineers inventing means to hold their life in flux." The psychologist Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Battmann offers the opposite perspective: "Action is the attempt to stabilize the world by reducing its variance and finding a stable ground.

"In recent years, patients with advanced end-stage heart failure have increased in numbers. The treatment consists of drug therapy, surgical therapy, mechanical support and heart transplantation. Due to the increasing shortage of organ donors, left ventricular assist devices (LVAD) are becoming the focus of clinical interest - not only as a bridge to heart transplantation, but more and more as an alternative to heart transplantation with destination therapy," PD Dr. Christian Heim (University Erlangen) and colleagues report in the new textbook "Extracorporeal Circulation". The experienced authors describe indications, applications and complications in detail. Additionally, future prospects are discussed: