Evaluation of routine microbiological techniques for establishing the diagnosis of catheter-related bloodstream infection caused by coagulase-negative staphylococci.

Microbiological diagnosis of catheter-related bloodstream infection (CR-BSI) is often based on isolation of indistinguishable micro-organisms from an explanted catheter tip and blood culture, confirmed by antibiograms. Whether phenotypic identification of coagulase-negative staphylococci (CoNS) allows an accurate diagnosis of CR-BSI to be established was evaluated. Eight patients with a diagnosis of CR-BSI had CoNS isolated from pure blood cultures and explanted catheter tips which were considered as indistinguishable strains by routine microbiological methods.

A prospective clinical trial to evaluate the microbial barrier of a needleless connector.

Needleless connectors are being increasingly used for direct access to intravascular catheters. However, the potential for microbial contamination of these devices and subsequent infection risk is still widely debated. In this study the microbial contamination rate associated with three-way stopcock luers with standard caps attached was compared to those with Y-type extension set luers with Clearlink needleless connectors attached.

Mutual enhancement of diverse terminologies.

The purpose of this study was to map the North American Nursing Diagnosis Association (NANDA) nursing diagnoses to the International Classification for Nursing Practice Version 1.0 (ICNP) and to compare the resulting representations and relationships to those within SNOMED Clinical Terms (CT). Independent reviewers reached agreement on 25 (i.

Sudden arrhythmic death syndrome: a national survey of sudden unexplained cardiac death.

Objective: To describe the characteristics of sudden arrhythmic death syndrome (SADS) and compare its incidence with official national mortality statistics for unascertained deaths.

Design And Setting: Sudden unexplained deaths were prospectively surveyed through 117 coroners' jurisdictions in England. Consecutive cases meeting the following criteria were included: white Caucasian, aged 4-64 years, no history of cardiac disease, last seen alive within 12 h of death, normal coroner's autopsy, cardiac pathologist's confirmation of a normal heart and negative toxicology.

Trombone tongue: a new clinical sign for significant medullary compression at the craniovertebral junction. Case report.

The authors describe a previously unreported clinical sign that may indicate the onset of significant compression of the medulla oblongata in cases of craniovertebral junction abnormalities. This 17-year-old boy presented with mild bilateral leg weakness. Imaging studies revealed severe basilar invagination and a marked Chiari malformation.

Life threatening epistaxis complicating extended maxillotomy for chordoma.

Postoperative hemorrhagic complications of the "open-door" maxillotomy approach to the skull base and clivus are uncommon. We report a case of maxillary artery pseudoaneurysm and discuss the management of this condition.

In vitro toxicity evaluation of single walled carbon nanotubes on human A549 lung cells.

This paper describes the in vitro cytotoxicity assessment of single walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNT) on A549 cells, a human lung cell line. Cellular viability was determined using the alamar blue (AB), neutral red (NR) and MTT assays, which evaluated metabolic, lysosomal and mitochondrial activity respectively. In addition, the total protein content of the cells was measured using the coomassie brilliant (CB) blue assay.

Practical definition of SNOMED CT concepts: The case of education, advice and counselling.

Rigour is needed in the construction of health terminologies to avoid introducing ambiguity and error into clinical records. When two large scale terminologies (SNOMED RT and Clinical terms Version 3) were merged to form SNOMED CT) a number duplicate and ambiguous concepts were introduced. The SNOMED nursing working group was tasked with producing a draft editorial policy to resolve duplications and ambiguities in terms related to education, advice and counselling.

A Tartan Warning: Results from the Royal College of Nursing (Scotland) on-line surveys.

Rapid advancements in Information and communication technologies are set to revolutionise the National Health Service across UK and billions of pounds are spent on modernising the service. The technology enabled service in Scotland will have a considerable impact on the working lives of care providers. Nursing professionals, being the largest single professional group in the care service, are likely to be the most affected by it.

Primary atypical sacral meningioma--not always benign.

We present a case of an atypical recurrent meningioma of the sacrum with pulmonary metastasis in a 31-year-old man. He presented with deep-seated buttock pain and urinary hesitancy for 3 months. MRI revealed a lesion occupying the central and left side of the sacral canal at the S1-S2 level.

Priority setting for health interventions in Mexico's System of Social Protection in Health.

Explicit priority setting presents Mexico with the opportunity to match the pressure and complexity of an advancing epidemiological transition with evidence-based policies driven by a fundamental concern for how to make the best use of scarce resources to improve population health. The Mexican priority-setting experience describes how standardised analytical approaches to decision making, mainly burden of disease and cost-effectiveness analyses, combine with other criteria--eg, being responsive to the legitimate non-health expectations of patients and ensuring fair financing across households--to design and implement a set of three differentiated health intervention packages. This process is a key element of a wider set of reform components aimed at extending health insurance, especially to the poor.

Retropharyngeal pseudomeningocele.

A 38-year-old male was found to have a retropharyngeal pseudomeningocele along with C1 - C2 dislocation. Absence of any possible history, misleading circumstantial evidence and rarity of the entity made it impossible to diagnose the condition preoperatively. Concurrent medical problems dominated and the patient died.

Health information literacy and competencies of information age students: results from the interactive online Research Readiness Self-Assessment (RRSA).

Background: In an era of easy access to information, university students who will soon enter health professions need to develop their information competencies. The Research Readiness Self-Assessment (RRSA) is based on the Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education, and it measures proficiency in obtaining health information, evaluating the quality of health information, and understanding plagiarism.

Objective: This study aimed to measure the proficiency of college-age health information consumers in finding and evaluating electronic health information; to assess their ability to discriminate between peer-reviewed scholarly resources and opinion pieces or sales pitches; and to examine the extent to which they are aware of their level of health information competency.

Nascent DNA processing by RecJ favors lesion repair over translesion synthesis at arrested replication forks in Escherichia coli.

DNA lesions that arrest replication can lead to rearrangements, mutations, or lethality when not processed accurately. After UV-induced DNA damage in Escherichia coli, RecA and several recF pathway proteins are thought to process arrested replication forks and ensure that replication resumes accurately. Here, we show that the RecJ nuclease and RecQ helicase, which partially degrade the nascent DNA at blocked replication forks, are required for the rapid recovery of DNA synthesis and prevent the potentially mutagenic bypass of UV lesions.

Dynamic degenerative lumbar spondylolisthesis: diagnosis with axial loaded magnetic resonance imaging.

Study Design: Retrospective review of case notes and imaging.

Objective: To show the advantage of axial loaded magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) for identification of dynamic degenerative spondylolisthesis as a suspected cause of spinal claudication.

Summary Of Background Data: Degenerative spondylolisthesis typically occurs at L4/L5 and is usually evident on plain radiography.