Showing posts with label infectious disease. Show all posts
Showing posts with label infectious disease. Show all posts

Thursday, May 26, 2011

Thirty Years of AIDS, Open for Questions: Videochat with the White House, AIDS.GOV

On Wednesday, June 1 at 3pm ET, join AIDS.gov in a live video chat with the White House to recognize “30 Years of AIDS”. The U.S. Surgeon General will provide opening remarks. Submit your questions online, in advance or during the event.

  • Jeffrey Crowley

    Jeffrey Crowley
    ONAP Director

  • Dr. Benjamin

    Dr. Benjamin
    Surgeon General of the United States Public Health Service

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Thursday, May 5, 2011

Africa: Immigration Law Means Sick May Be Deported

French doctors are worried that a proposed immigration law will stop foreigners receiving vital medical treatment. The bill, which a key committee is discussing Wednesday, would scrap a provision that since 1998 has allowed immigrants temporary residency for medical treatment in France.

Louise (not her real name), a 42-year-old Nigerian woman, is sitting in a hospital room in Argenteuil, a northern Paris suburb. She's been here for several days.

Doctors have figured out that she has a stomach infection, but they are running more tests because she is HIV-positive.

Radio report: Medical visas threatened

Louise came to France in 2008, because she says she had problems with the Nigerian government. Even though her request for political asylum from France was turned down, she is still living here legally, because of her medical condition.

She says she had no idea she had the disease until doctors performed medical tests when she arrived in France.

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Andrew Lopez, RN
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Thursday, April 28, 2011

Time to Eliminate Dangerous Injection Practices by Clinicians : Health in 30

By Barbara Ficarra, RN, BSN, MPA

Thanks to Laura Landro for shining light on unsafe injections in her WSJ blog, “Unsafe Injection Practices Persist Despite Education Efforts.”

Landro writes:

“A new push is underway to eliminate unsafe injection practices, which remain a persistent safety problem despite years of efforts to educate clinicians about the risks of re-using needles, syringes and drug vials.

In the U.S., failure to follow safe practices in delivering intravenous medications and injections has resulted in more than 30 outbreaks of infectious disease including hepatitis C, and the notification of more than 125,000 patients about potential exposure just in the last decade, according to health-care purchasing alliance Premier Inc.”

As a registered nurse this is unthinkable.  Learning to administer injections safely is “patient care 101.”  There is no excuse for any health care professional to unsafely inject patients.

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Andrew Lopez, RN
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Saturday, April 16, 2011

Multidrug-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus in US Meat and Poultry

Abstract

We characterized the prevalence, antibiotic susceptibility profiles, and genotypes of Staphylococcus aureus among US meat and poultry samples (n = 136). S. aureus contaminated 47% of samples, and multidrug resistance was common among isolates (52%). S. aureus genotypes and resistance profiles differed significantly among sample types, suggesting food animal–specific contamination.

Antimicrobials are used extensively in food animal production, where they are often applied subtherapeutically for growth promotion and routine disease prevention [1]. Surveys conducted by the National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System (NARMS) indicate that retail meat and poultry products are frequently contaminated with multidrug-resistant Campylobacter species, Salmonella species, Enterococcus species, and Escherichia coli [2]; but little is known about the prevalence of other antibiotic-resistant pathogens in the US food supply.

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Andrew Lopez, RN
Nursefriendly, Inc. A New Jersey Corporation.
38 Tattersall Drive, Mantua New Jersey 08051
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Big Pharma backs deal to boost flu pandemic readiness | Reuters

Virus samples will be shared globally in exchange for vaccines produced from them under a landmark deal to improve preparedness for a flu pandemic, diplomats at the World Health Organization said on Saturday.

In a statement to Reuters, the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations, which represents 26 research-based drugmakers, welcomed the plan and confirmed the commitments its members had undertaken as part of it.

Negotiators ended an all-night session with a draft agreement accepted by all countries, including the United States, the last to join the consensus, diplomats said.

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Sincerely,

Andrew Lopez, RN
Nursefriendly, Inc. A New Jersey Corporation.
38 Tattersall Drive, Mantua New Jersey 08051
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856-415-9617, (fax) 415-9618

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Monday, April 11, 2011

How Vaccinations Work | International Medical Council on Vaccination

Philip F. Incao, MD

In order to use vaccinations wisely, we need to understand exactly how they work. Until recently, the mechanism of action of vaccinations was always understood to be simply that they cause an increase in antibody levels (titers) against a specific disease antigen (bacterium or virus), thus preventing infection with that bacterial or viral antigen. In recent years science has learned that the human immune system is much more complicated than we thought. It is composed of two functional branches or compartments that may work together in a mutually cooperative way or in a mutually antagonistic way depending on the health of the individual.

One branch is the humoral immune system (or approximately Th2 function), which primarily produces antibodies in the blood circulation as a sensing or recognizing function of the immune system to the presence of foreign antigens in the body. The other branch is the cellular or cell-mediated immune system (or approximately Th1 function), which primarily destroys, digests and expels foreign antigens out of the body through the activity of its cells found in the thymus, tonsils, adenoids, spleen, lymph nodes and lymph system throughout the body. This process of destroying, digesting and discharging foreign antigens from the body is known as the acute inflammatory response and is often accompanied by the classic signs of inflammation: fever, pain, malaise and discharge of mucus, pus, skin rash or diarrhea.

These two functional branches of the immune system may be compared to the two functions in eating: tasting and recognizing the food on the one hand, and digesting the food and eliminating the food waste on the other hand. In the same way, the humoral or Th2 branch of the immune system tastes and recognizes and even remembers foreign antigens and the cellular or Th1 branch of the immune system digests and eliminates the foreign antigens from the body. But just as too much repeated tasting of food will ruin the appetite, so also too much repeated stimulation of the tasting humoral immune system by an antigen will inhibit and suppress the digesting and eliminating function of the cellular immune system. In other words, over stimulating antibody production can suppress the acute inflammatory response of the cellular immune system! 1

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Andrew Lopez, RN
Nursefriendly, Inc. A New Jersey Corporation.
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Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Male Circumcision and Risk for HIV Transmission: Implications for the United States | Factsheets | CDC HIV/AIDS

Several types of research have documented that male circumcision significantly reduces the risk of HIV acquisition by men during penile-vaginal sex.

Biologic Plausibility

Compared with the dry external skin surface, the inner mucosa of the foreskin has less keratinization (deposition of fibrous protein), a higher density of target cells for HIV infection (Langerhans cells), and is more susceptible to HIV infection than other penile tissue in laboratory studies [2]. The foreskin may also have greater susceptibility to traumatic epithelial disruptions (tears) during intercourse, providing a portal of entry for pathogens, including HIV [3]. In addition, the microenvironment in the preputial sac between the unretracted foreskin and the glans penis may be conducive to viral survival [1]. Finally, the higher rates of sexually transmitted genital ulcerative disease, such as syphilis, observed in uncircumcised men may also increase susceptibility to HIV infection [4].

International Observational Studies

A systematic review and meta-analysis that focused on male circumcision and heterosexual transmission of HIV in Africa was published in 2000 [5]. It included 19 cross-sectional studies, 5 case-control studies, 3 cohort studies, and 1 partner study. A substantial protective effect of male circumcision on risk for HIV infection was noted, along with a reduced risk for genital ulcer disease. After adjustment for confounding factors in the population-based studies, the relative risk for HIV infection was 44% lower in circumcised men. The strongest association was seen in men at high risk, such as patients at sexually transmitted disease (STD) clinics, for whom the adjusted relative risk was 71% lower for circumcised men.

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Andrew Lopez, RN
Nursefriendly, Inc. A New Jersey Corporation.
38 Tattersall Drive, Mantua New Jersey 08051
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Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Man's death tied to salmonella in Rhode Island

An elderly man who tested positive for salmonella has died, according to Rhode Island officials investigating an outbreak of salmonella that has sickened 39 people.

Six fresh cases were reported on Tuesday and, while the source of contamination has not been determined, pastries from a local bakery were being recalled, said Annemarie Beardsworth, spokeswoman for the state Department of Health.

The man who died was in his 80s and lived in a Warwick nursing home that recently bought pastries from DeFusco's Bakery in Johnston, she said.

Inspectors went to DeFusco's and found cross-contamination and major violations of food handling, she said.

The most likely cause of salmonella was consumption of pastries that came in contact with infected raw eggs, the Health Department said. Pastry shells at DeFusco's had been stored in used egg crates, it said.

Fifteen people were sickened at the nursing home, while the rest of the 39 cases were elsewhere in the community. Twelve people were in hospitals, Beardsworth said.

"What we have now is a group of people who are ill with salmonella," she said. "What we don't have is laboratory-confirmed evidence of a source of contamination.

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Andrew Lopez, RN
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Monday, March 21, 2011

World TB Day, March 24, 2011, March 21, 2011 News Release - National Institutes of Health (NIH)

World TB Day
March 24, 2011

Statement of Christine F. Sizemore, Ph.D., and Anthony S. Fauci, M.D.
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
National Institutes of Health

The theme of World TB Day 2011 — "On the move against TB: Transforming the fight towards elimination"— reflects renewed momentum to approach the global problem of tuberculosis with greater intensity and seriousness of purpose. This growing interest is broad-based, emerging from leaders in public health to laboratory scientists, from physicians to activists.

Today, about one-third of the world's population is infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb), the bacterium that causes TB. Most people have no symptoms because the bacterium is inactive, or latent, but individuals with symptoms of active TB disease can infect others. According to World Health Organization (WHO) estimates, in 2009 more than 14 million people had active TB, leading to 1.7 million deaths, or 4,600 deaths each day. Among people infected with the bacteria, those who have certain other conditions, such as HIV/AIDS and diabetes, are more likely to develop active TB and to die from it. Because of this deadly synergy, TB has become the leading cause of death among people with HIV/AIDS.

Although TB control programs have led to a decline in cases worldwide, the emergence and spread of drug-resistant strains of Mtb challenge the way we currently approach TB diagnosis and treatment. Extensively drug-resistant TB, while relatively rare, has been confirmed in 58 countries, including the United States, and likely is present in many more. It has become necessary not just to identify the infection but also to determine the proper therapy for patients at the earliest stages of disease.

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Andrew Lopez, RN
Nursefriendly, Inc. A New Jersey Corporation.
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Education Resources, Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology, Inc APIC |

APIC works to provide information to both the general public and healthcare professionals. The brochures on this page are regularly reviewed and updated as needed to insure that the information provided is current. These materials are available for you to download, copy and distribute free of charge.  These pamphlets are intended to provide a general reference to each topic. No brochure can adequately diagnose a medical condition. If in doubt regarding your symptoms, please contact a healthcare professional.

 


  • 10 tips for preventing the spread of infection
  • Los Hechos Sobre Chlamydia
  • Antibiotic Safety
  • Meningococcal Meningitis
  • Chlamydia
  • Mold in Your Home
  • Companion Animals and Your Health
  • Patient Safety - Protecting Yourself from Medical Errors
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    Monday, February 28, 2011

    Fast response crucial in outbreaks of food-borne illness, study finds - USATODAY.com

    Nearly three years after a nationwide salmonella outbreak that sickened about 1,500 people and claimed two lives, U.S. epidemiologists have learned that speed is of the essence in identifying sources of food contamination and preventing further infection.

      But speed requires resources that cost money and, as an editorial accompanying the paper in the Feb. 23 online issue of the
    New England Journal of Medicine points out, funds may not be forthcoming.

    Although the recently signed Food Safety Modernization Act could help the U.S. Food and Drug Administration respond better to outbreaks of food-borne illness, the reality is that Congress still needs to authorize the money, the editorial stated.

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    Friday, February 18, 2011

    C. Difficile Spreads from Hospital to Community, ACG from MedPage Today

    Clostridium difficile infection has spread from the hospital to the community but has proved manageable thus far, according to data reported here.

    From 1991 to 2005, the incidence of community-acquired C. difficile in Olmsted County, Minn., quadrupled but still remained less common than the hospital-acquired gastrointestinal infection, Sahil Khanna, MD, of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., said at the American College of Gastroenterology meeting.

    "Patients with community-acquired C. difficile infection were younger, more likely to be female, and less likely to have severe infections," Khanna observed.

    Epidemiologic studies have shown an increasing incidence of both nosocomial and community-acquired infections. However, few studies have looked at the incidence of community-acquired C. difficile, said Khanna.

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    Friday, February 11, 2011

    Balancing infection control with the patient experience, KevinMD.com

    by Kevin Pho, MD

    Hospitals have recently been stepping up their infection control procedures, in the wake of news about iatrogenic infections afflicting patients when they are admitted.

    Doctors are increasingly wearing a variety of protective garb — gowns, gloves and masks — while seeing patients.

    In an interesting New York Times column, Pauline Chen wonders how this affects the doctor-patient relationship.

    She cites a study from the Annals of Family Medicine, which concluded that,

    fear of contagion among physicians, studies have shown, can compromise the quality of care delivered. When compared with patients not in isolation, those individuals on contact precautions have fewer interactions with clinicians, more delays in care, decreased satisfaction and greater incidences of depression and anxiety. These differences translate into more noninfectious complications like falls and pressure ulcers and an increase of as much at 100 percent in the overall incidence of adverse events.

    Hospitals are in a no-win situation here. On one hand, they have to do all they can to minimize the risk of healthcare-acquired infections, but on the other, doctors need to strive for a closer bond with patients — which protective garb sometimes can impede.

    More research is clearly needed to determine how much protection is actually needed to prevent the spread of infectious disease.

    For instance, Dr. Chen cites studies where,

    researchers at the Medical College of Virginia in Richmond found that the rate of infection was identical whether health care workers wore gowns and gloves with only the patients in isolation or whether they wore only gloves with all patients.

    So there’s some evidence that being overly protective may not necessarily help.

    The key is finding the right balance between infection control and preserving the physician-patient relationship. With rapidly advancing, and sometimes impersonal, technology, combined with the legitimate fear of hospital-acquired contagion, it’s easy to forget about the patient experience during their hospital stay.

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    Wednesday, February 2, 2011

    Cash machines 'as dirty as toilets' - Telegraph

    Experts took swabs from the numeric key pads on a string of city centre ATMs around England which are used by thousands of shoppers every day.

    They then took similar swabs from the seats of nearby public lavatories and compared the bacteria under microscopes in a lab.

    The swab were left to grow overnight and samples from both locations were found to contain pseudomonads and bacillus, bacterias which are known to cause sickness and diarrhoea.

    Yesterday (Mon) Dr Richard Hastings, microbiologist for BioCote, a built-in, antibacterial product coating, said: ''We were interested in comparing the levels of bacterial contamination between heavily-used ATM machines and public lavatories.

    ''We were surprised by our results because the ATM machines were shown to be heavily contaminated with bacteria; to the same level as nearby public lavatories.

    ''In addition the bacteria we detected on ATMs were similar to those from the toilet, which are well known as causes of common human illnesses.''

    BioCote carried out the swab tests after they carried out a survey which revealed Brits consider public lavatories to be the biggest health risk.

    The study of 3,000 adults also revealed public telephones are considered the biggest health risk.

    You might want to wear gloves when you use the ATM next.

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    Sunday, January 9, 2011

    Starve a Cold, Feed a Fever? | Patient Advocate - Kitty Wilde, RN

    Do you starve a cold and feed a fever when you’re feeling under the weather? Or is it the other way around?

    Good news — starving is never the correct answer.

    When you eat a nutritional, well-balanced diet, many other factors fall in place that keep your body functioning optimally. Foods that are rich in nutrients help fight infections and may help to prevent illness. Because a wide array of nutrients in foods — some of which we may not even know about — are essential for wellness, relying on dietary supplements (vitamins and minerals) for good nutrition may limit your intake to just the known nutritional compounds rather than letting you get the full benefit of all nutrients available in food.

    Including more raw fruits and vegetables in your diet is the best way to ensure a high intake of antioxidants. And when you cook these super-nutrients, be sure you cook them using as little liquid as possible to prevent nutrient loss.

    To read the rest of the article, click on the link above.

    See also, patient advocates:
    http://www.nursefriendly.com/nursing/consumer.advocate/patient.awareness.orga...
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    Monday, January 3, 2011

    CDC - Seasonal Influenza (Flu) - Flu Activity & Surveillance

    Flu Activity & Surveillance

    Reports & Surveillance Methods in the United States

    Current United States Flu Activity Map Weekly U.S. Influenza Surveillance Report International Influenza Surveillance

    Situation Update: Summary of Weekly FluView

    Full FluView Report

    Overview of Influenza Surveillance in the United States

    Past Weekly Surveillance Reports and Historical Data

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    Wednesday, December 29, 2010

    Study: Surgical Delays Have Profoundly Adverse Impact | National Nursing News

    A new study emphasizes why caregivers must work to minimize delays in certain elective surgical procedures for patients who have been admitted to the hospital.

    Delays substantially increase the risk of infectious complications and raise hospital costs, according to a comprehensive study in the December issue of the Journal of the American College of Surgeons.

    Using a nationwide sample of 163,006 patients ages 40 and older between 2003 and 2007, the authors evaluated patients who developed postoperative complications after one of three high-volume elective surgical procedures: coronary bypass graft, colon resections and lung resections.

    For each type of procedure, according to the researchers, infection rates increased significantly from those performed on the first day of admission to those performed a day later, two to five days later and six to 10 days later. With each procedure, there was a difference of at least 10 percentage points between infection rates performed on the day of admission and those performed six to 10 days later.

    Delays also increased total hospital costs from $36,079 to $47,5237 for CABG, $20,265 to $29,887 for colon resections and $26,323 to $30,571 for lung resections.

    The occurrence of infection after surgical procedures remains a major source of ill health and expense despite extensive prevention efforts via educational programs, clinical guidelines and hospital policies, according to the researchers.

    The analysis “confirms a direct correlation between delaying procedures and negative patient outcomes,” lead author Todd R. Vogel, MD, MPH, FACS, assistant professor of surgery at the University of Medicine & Dentistry of New Jersey, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, New Brunswick, said in a news release.

    “As pay-for-performance models become increasingly prevalent, it will be imperative for hospitals to consider policies aimed at preventing delays and thereby reducing infection rates.”

    Patients more likely to experience in-hospital surgical delays were age 80 and older, female and minorities. They had existing health issues such as congestive heart failure, chronic pulmonary disease and renal failure.

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