Objective: 2022 - 2023 mpox outbreak necessitated rapid distribution of JYNNEOS vaccines from US Strategic National Stockpile to state and local public health agencies. New Hampshire's centralized public health structure required partnering with healthcare facilities to reach at-risk persons. Among the 67 organizations contacted to partner with, only 7 established public JYNNEOS vaccine clinics.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: An antibiogram is a summary of antibiotic susceptibility patterns for selected bacterial pathogens and antibiotics. The New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services' Division of Public Health Services (DPHS) sought to create an annual state antibiogram to monitor statewide antibiotic resistance trends, guide appropriate empiric antibiotic prescribing, and inform future statewide antibiotic stewardship.
Methods: Through legislative authority, DPHS required hospital laboratories to report antibiogram data annually.
Background: Healthcare systems and public health agencies use different methods to measure the impact of substance use (SU) on population health. We studied the ability of systems to accurately capture data on drug use-associated infective endocarditis (DUA-IE).
Methods: We conducted a retrospective analysis of patients with IE discharge diagnosis from an academic medical center, 2011-2017, comparing data from hospital Electronic Health Record (EHR) to State Uniform Hospital Discharge Data Set (UHDDS).
Background: Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are synthetic chemicals used in manufacturing that resist environmental degradation, can leach into drinking water, and bioaccumulate in tissues. Some studies have shown associations with negative health outcomes. In May 2014, a New Hampshire public drinking water supply was found to be contaminated with PFAS from a former U.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjectives: Opioid-related overdoses and deaths in New Hampshire have increased substantially in recent years, similar to increases observed across the United States. We queried emergency department (ED) data in New Hampshire to monitor opioid-related ED encounters as part of the public health response to this health problem.
Methods: We obtained data on opioid-related ED encounters for the period January 1, 2011, through December 31, 2015, from New Hampshire's syndromic surveillance ED data system by querying for (1) chief complaint text related to the words "fentanyl," "heroin," "opiate," and "opioid" and (2) opioid-related International Classification of Diseases ( ICD) codes.
We surveyed public health co-workers regarding attitudes toward a physician who returned to New Hampshire after volunteering in the West African Ebola outbreak. An unexpectedly large (18.0%) proportion of staff expressed discomfort with the Ebola responder returning to work.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFInfect Control Hosp Epidemiol
September 2013
We sequentially increased the number of wall-mounted alcohol-based hand rub dispensers in a small medical unit to evaluate effects on hand hygiene performance. Above a certain point, addition of more dispensers did not increase hand hygiene frequency, which appeared to be influenced more by location than by total number of dispensers.
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