N95 Respirators vs Medical Masks for Preventing Influenza Among Health Care Personnel: A Randomized Clinical Trial.

Importance: Clinical studies have been inconclusive about the effectiveness of N95 respirators and medical masks in preventing health care personnel (HCP) from acquiring workplace viral respiratory infections.

Objective: To compare the effect of N95 respirators vs medical masks for prevention of influenza and other viral respiratory infections among HCP.

Design, Setting, And Participants: A cluster randomized pragmatic effectiveness study conducted at 137 outpatient study sites at 7 US medical centers between September 2011 and May 2015, with final follow-up in June 2016.

Roles and Role Ambiguity in Patient- and Caregiver-Performed Outpatient Parenteral Antimicrobial Therapy.

Background: Complicated medical therapies traditionally performed in acute care hospitals are increasingly moving to the home, requiring patients and informal caregivers to perform complicated medical tasks. For example, in outpatient parenteral antimicrobial therapy (OPAT), patients and caregivers perform antimicrobial infusions and venous catheter care. The objective of this study was to characterize patient understanding of patient, caregiver, and health care worker roles in OPAT and barriers to fulfilling these roles, with the goal of understanding how to best support patients and their caregivers.

It's Complicated: Patient and Informal Caregiver Performance of Outpatient Parenteral Antimicrobial Therapy-Related Tasks.

Outpatient parenteral antimicrobial therapy (OPAT) requires patients and caregivers to infuse antimicrobials through venous catheters (VCs) in the home. The objective of this study was to perform a patient-centered goal-directed task analysis to identify what is required for successful completion of OPAT. The authors performed 40 semi-structured patient interviews and 20 observations of patients and caregivers performing OPAT-related tasks.

Hazards from physical attributes of the home environment among patients on outpatient parenteral antimicrobial therapy.

Background: Outpatient parenteral antimicrobial therapy (OPAT) requires that patients and their caregivers administer antimicrobial medications in the home via venous catheters. Hazards from physical attributes of the home environment may impede safe performance of OPAT tasks.

Methods: We performed a qualitative study, including semistructured telephone interviews and contextual inquiries, of patients performing OPAT tasks inside the home.

The Prevalence of Antibiotic-Resistant Nasal Carriage among Industrial Hog Operation Workers, Community Residents, and Children Living in Their Households: North Carolina, USA.

Background: Antibiotic use in industrial hog operations (IHOs) can support the emergence of antibiotic-resistant (ABR) . The extent of ABR exposure in IHO workers and children living in their households remains unclear.

Objective: We investigated ABR nasal carriage prevalence among adults with versus without occupational exposure to IHOs and among children living in their households.

Environmental Exposures and the Risk of Central Venous Catheter Complications and Readmissions in Home Infusion Therapy Patients.

BACKGROUND Patients are frequently discharged with central venous catheters (CVCs) for home infusion therapy. OBJECTIVE To study a prospective cohort of patients receiving home infusion therapy to identify environmental and other risk factors for complications. DESIGN Prospective cohort study between March and December 2015.