Impact of an ultrasound-driven diagnostic protocol at early intensive-care stay: a randomized-controlled trial.

Background: Point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) is a tool in increasing use, but there is still a lack of basics for its routine use and evidence of its impact in intensive care.

Objective: To measure the impact of POCUS on resource utilization, diagnostic accuracy, and clinical management in medical-surgical intensive care units (ICUs).

Methods: Prospective, controlled study, in two polyvalent ICUs.

Delirium in a Latin American intensive care unit. A prospective cohort study of mechanically ventilated patients.

Objective: To establish the prevalence of delirium in a general intensive care unit and to identify associated factors, clinical expression and the influence on outcomes.

Methods: This was a prospective cohort study in a medical surgical intensive care unit. The Richmond Agitation-Sedation Scale and Confusion Assessment Method for the Intensive Care Unit were used daily to identify delirium in mechanically ventilated patients.

[Use of polymerase chain reaction for the diagnosis of central nervous system infections].

In the present work, the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay and his variants RT-PCR and Multiplex PCR were applied for the detection of specific sequences of Enterovirus, Human Herpes viruses (Herpes simple virus, Human Herpes virus type 6, Cytomegalovirus, Epstein Barr virus, and Varicella Zoster), Human Immunodeficiency virus, Toxoplasma gondii, Mycobacterium tuberculosis and Mycoplasma pneumoniae in patients' cohorts grouped by medical suspicion of meningoencephalitis. Of 326 samples of processed cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), 93 samples (28.5%) were positive for the different infectious agents.

Cross-resistance to pyrethroid and organophosphorus insecticides induced by selection with temephos in Aedes aegypti (Diptera: Culicidae) from Cuba.

A sample of Aedes aegypti (L.) from Santiago de Cuba, Cuba, with a high level of temephos resistance (19.58x at the 50% lethal concentration [LC50]), was subjected to temephos selection to evaluate the utility of this organophosphate insecticide for mosquito control.