Causes and consequences of anti-infective drug stock-outs.

Anti-infective drugs stock-outs are increasingly frequent, and this is unlikely to change. There are numerous causes for this, mostly related to parameters difficult to control: i) 60 to 80% of raw material or components are produced outside of Europe (compared to 20% 30 years ago), with subsequent loss of independence for their procurement; ii) the economic crisis drives the pharmaceutical companies to stop producing drugs of limited profitability (even among important drugs); iii) the enforcement of regulatory requirements and quality control procedures result in an increasing number of drugs being blocked during production. The therapeutic class most affected by drug stock-outs is that of anti-infective drugs, especially injectable ones, and many therapeutic dead ends have recently occurred.

[Suitability of intraoperative autotransfusion].

This work presents the procedure applied by our hospital to assess the quality and security of intra operative autotransfusion. The suitability of the three following variables has to be constantly assessed: performance of the machines to concentrate and wash collected blood, bacterial contamination of processed blood and rate of adverse events. We note that the procedure is applied with participation of medical and nursing staff.

[Pressure exerted on tracheal cuffs in intubation in the presence of nitrous oxide].

Objective: To compare the time course of endotracheal tube cuff pressures in presence of nitrous oxide (N2O), obtained in a tracheal model with those measured during clinical anaesthesia.

Study Design: Experimental and clinical prospective study.

Material: Twelve brands of low-pressure tracheal tubes.