This study of the treatment of aggressive lymphoma in patients 60 years old or younger compared cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, vincristine, and prednisone (CHOP), the standard treatment, with an immediate course of high-dose chemotherapy plus transplantation of autologous hematopoietic stem cells. The high-dose therapy was superior to CHOP for patients at high intermediate risk.

This study describes the genetic cause of some cases of fatal surfactant deficiency in newborns. The gene encoding ATP-binding cassette transporter A3 (ABCA3) was mutated in 76 percent of a selected sample of 21 patients, and the patients with such mutations had abnormal lamellar bodies — the subcellular vesicles in which surfactant is stored.

In an earlier placebo-controlled trial, dexamethasone was administered to neonates as a treatment for respiratory distress syndrome. When children who had participated in that trial were about eight years of age, the investigators conducted a second study to determine the long-term effects of treatment. Children in the dexamethasone group were shorter, had smaller head circumferences, and had poorer scores than control children on a number of tests of cognitive and motor function.

Mutations in genes encoding chloride transporters cause Bartter's syndrome. An antenatal form associated with salt wasting and deafness has been observed in persons with mutations in BSND, the gene encoding barttin, a protein controlling the membrane insertion of two distinct chloride transporters. This report describes a child with the syndrome yet a normal BSND gene. The child had mutations in each of two genes encoding the chloride transporters ClC-Ka and ClC-Kb. The data provide strong evidence that barttin regulates ClC-type chloride channels and thus provide new insight into renal salt handling.