#214 COVID Cakes 3: Llamas, Remdesivir, Strokes, Predicting the Future, and More!

Elevate your critical appraisal skills as we review the first RCT of remdesivir and share the latest and greatest COVID-19 stories including: Llama antibodies, Stroke statistics, Future Waves, Exit Strategies and Awake Proning. We’re joined by everyone’s favorite Curbsider/internist/epidemiologist, Rahul Ganatra MD MPH (@rbganatra). Rahul provides critical appraisal of the newest randomized control trial (RCT) on remdesivir from the Lancet, and gives us a lesson on why statistical power is so important to consider. We also share updates on strokes, awake proning, pandemic predictions, and we reveal another reason to love llamas (besides those luscious lashes). Llama mia, here we go again! Show Notes | Spotify | Swag! | Top Picks | Mailing List | [email protected] | CME! Credits Written and Produced by: Sarah P. Roberts MPH, Rahul Ganatra MD, MPH, Emi Okamoto MD, Paul Williams MD and Matthew Watto MD Cover Art: Beth Garbitelli Hosts: Matthew Watto MD, Paul Williams MD, Rahul Ganatra MD MPH, Emi Okamoto MD , Sarah P. Roberts MPH, Editor: Matthew Watto MD (written materials); Clair Morgan of nodderly.com Sponsor: VCU Health CE Time Stamps 00:00 Intro 02:10 Fun animal facts: Llama antibodies 09:10 Remdesivir RCT by Wang et al 12:40 Power and Sample Size 16:32 Baseline Characteristics, Results and Author’s conclusions 19:15 Rahul’s conclusions: How chance and bias affected the results 24:00 Right censoring; Viral load and timing of antivirals 30:30 Final thoughts on Remdesivir RCT by Wang et al; Looking ahead to the NIAID (ACTT) trial 33:53 Are patients really having fewer strokes and heart attacks? 38:20 Awake proning 43:30 Paul teaches us not to use the term “happy hypoxemic” 45:00 CIDRAP viewpoint on future waves and exit strategies 50:22 Outro