Internal Medicine
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MERS: From the Middle East to East Asia
On May 20, 2015, a 68-year-old Korean man with fever and cough who had returned eight days previously from a trip to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates was found to be infected with MERS coronavirus.
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Travel Medicine: News You Can Use
In May, 1,296 travel medicine specialists gathered in Quebec City, Canada, for the 14th biannual conference of the International Society of Travel Medicine. Several of the topics discussed are practically relevant to readers of Infectious Disease Alert, so we offer this Top 10 list of news items.
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Infectious Diseases Grand Rounds — Stanford University
CASE: A 55-year-old male with an atypical cause of osteo-articular infection
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Measles-induced Immunomodulation and Impact on Childhood Mortality
Population-level studies in high-resource countries demonstrated that fluctuations in childhood mortality from all infectious diseases are strongly associated with measles infection. The effect is likely attributable to generalized immunomodulation that follows measles infection, with a duration of two to three years.
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Antibiotics for Intraabdominal Infections: Less Is More
A multi-center, randomized trial comparing patients with complicated intraabdominal infections found no difference in outcomes between those who received 4 days of antibiotic therapy vs. 8 days after adequate source control.
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Duration of Antibiotic Treatment for Vertebral Osteomyelitis
Three hundred fifty-nine patients with pyogenic vertebral osteomyelitis were randomized to 6 weeks vs. 12 weeks of antibiotic treatment in an open-label controlled trial. Six weeks of antibiotics was found to be not inferior to 12 weeks of treatment.
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When Do Ventilator Modes Matter?
Although pressure-controlled ventilation and volume-controlled ventilation approach mechanical breath delivery differently in terms of inspiratory flow and airway pressure characteristics, this comprehensive review found no significant differences in terms of their impact on breathing mechanics or gas exchange in patients with various forms of acute respiratory failure.
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Inferior Vena Cava Filters and Recurrent Pulmonary Embolism
Even in patients who seem most vulnerable to additional embolism, retrievable inferior vena cava filter placement plus anticoagulation did not improve outcomes vs. anticoagulation alone.
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Decreasing Cross-Transmission of Carbapenemase-Producing Enterobacteriaceae
The implementation of a bundled infection control intervention was able to significantly decrease cross-transmission of a multi-drug-resistant pathogen and decrease healthcare-associated infections in an long-term acute care hospitals population.
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Is Fresh Blood Better?
The Age of Blood Evaluation trial supports the notion that the relative expiration date of red blood cells is not important.