Upper gastrointestinal bleeding articles from across Nature Portfolio

Restrictive transfusion strategy saves blood and is safe in most clinical settings, including gastrointestinal bleeding. However, generalizability of a restrictive transfusion approach in acute gastrointestinal bleeding remains controversial as it often affects elderly patients with major cardiovascular comorbidity who have been excluded from existing trials.

Predicting outcomes in upper gastrointestinal bleeding (UGIB) is important for identifying patients at high risk of morbidity and mortality who would benefit from early intervention. Various scoring systems have been developed to this end, but could clinical judgment replace or complement these risk stratification scores?

Algorithms can predict the risk of rebleeding and mortality in patients with upper gastrointestinal bleeding, but not the risk of rebleeding following endoscopic treatment in patients with ulcers. A recent meta-analysis has addressed this issue, and could facilitate the development of methods to predict rebleeding and endoscopic treatments to reduce rebleeding.