Publications by authors named "Dancer S"

SUMMARYIn healthcare settings, contaminated surfaces play an important role in the transmission of nosocomial pathogens potentially resulting in healthcare-associated infections (HAI). Pathogens can be transmitted directly from frequent hand-touch surfaces close to patients or indirectly by staff and visitors. HAI risk depends on exposure, extent of contamination, infectious dose (ID), virulence, hygiene practices, and patient vulnerability.

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Background: The environment of healthcare institutions plays a major role in the transmission of multidrug resistant organisms (MDRO) and likely in subsequent healthcare-associated infections (HAIs). Probiotic cleaning products are a novel option for environmental cleaning. They represent a sustainable and biodegradable alternative to conventional chemical disinfectants for controlling microbial bioburden, and preventing pathogen transmission in hospital environments.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study investigates the CT features of Morel-Lavallée lesions (MLLs) in cats, focusing on their occurrence following trauma and their unique fluid characteristics.
  • Three young cats with recurrent swelling after pelvic limb trauma were examined, all showing fluid-filled spaces between the dermis and deep fascia.
  • MLLs can be easily misdiagnosed due to similar appearances to other injuries, posing risks like significant skin necrosis if not treated properly.
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Environmental cleaning is essential to patient and health worker safety, yet it is a substantially neglected area in terms of knowledge, practice, and capacity-building, especially in resource-limited settings. Public health advocacy, research and investment are urgently needed to develop and implement cost-effective interventions to improve environmental cleanliness and, thus, overall healthcare quality and safety. We outline here the CLEAN Group Consensus exercise yielding twelve urgent research questions, grouped into four thematic areas: standards, system strengthening, behaviour change, and innovation.

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Computed tomography is a valuable diagnostic technique in the clinical work-up of dogs with oropharyngeal trauma and bleeding. Traumatic extravasation can manifest as a pseudoaneurysm. A pseudoaneurysm is an extraluminal accumulation of blood that is contained by the adventitia layer or neighboring tissues.

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Background: Cervical cancer is the fourth most common cancer in women, with an estimated 342,000 deaths worldwide in 2020. Current standard of care in the UK for locally advanced cervical cancer is concurrent chemoradiotherapy with weekly cisplatin, yet 5-year overall survival rates are only 65% with a distant relapse rate of 50%. Inhibitors of Apoptosis Proteins (IAPs) are often overexpressed in cancer cells and associated with tumour progression and resistance to treatment.

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Background: Effective surface cleaning in hospitals is crucial to prevent the transmission of pathogens. However, hospitals in low- and middle-income countries face cleaning challenges due to limited resources and inadequate training.

Methods: We assessed the effectiveness of a modified TEACH CLEAN programme for trainers in reducing surface microbiological contamination in the newborn unit of a tertiary referral hospital in The Gambia.

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Objective: To differentially diagnose and contextualize pathological lesions suggestive of rheumatoid arthritis.

Materials: The skeletal remains of a 25-30-year-old female dated to c. 1750-1550 BCE from a Nubian Pan-Grave cemetery at the site of Sheik Mohamed, near Aswan, Egypt.

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Hospital cleaning: past, present, and future.

Antimicrob Resist Infect Control

August 2023

Introduction: The importance of hospital cleaning for controlling healthcare-associated infection (HAI) has taken years to acknowledge. This is mainly because the removal of dirt is inextricably entwined with gender and social status, along with lack of evidence and confusion over HAI definitions. Reducing so-called endogenous infection due to human carriage entails patient screening, decolonisation and/or prophylaxis, whereas adequate ventilation, plumbing and cleaning are needed to reduce exogenous infection.

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Background: Evidence from a previous systematic review indicates that patients admitted to a room where the previous occupant had a multidrug-resistant bacterial infection resulted in an increased risk of subsequent colonisation and infection with the same organism for the next room occupant. In this paper, we have sought to expand and update this review.

Methods: A systematic review and meta-analysis was undertaken.

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Article Synopsis
  • French bulldogs (FBD) are more likely to develop humeral condylar fractures (HCF) compared to spaniel breeds, with FBD often presenting at a young age (median 3.7 months).
  • HCF typically manifests as fractures of the lateral condyle in both breed groups, and CT scans show significant levels of sclerosis at the fracture site in both FBDs (62%) and spaniels (95%).
  • In the contralateral elbows, FBDs exhibit a lower prevalence of additional elbow pathologies like medial coronoid issues compared to spaniels, suggesting humeral intracondylar fissures may contribute to fracture risk in FBD.
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Canine oral melanoma (OM) has highly aggressive behavior, with frequent local metastasis. Computed tomography 3D volumetric analysis is an accurate predictor of lymph node (LN) metastasis of oral cancers in humans but whether this is true for dogs with OM is unknown. In this retrospective observational study, CT imaging was used to assess mandibular and retropharyngeal lymphocenter (LC) changes in dogs with nodal metastatic (n = 12) and non-metastatic (n = 10) OM, then these findings were compared with those of healthy control dogs (n = 11).

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Purpose Of Review: The coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic has had a wide-ranging and profound impact on how we think about the transmission of respiratory viruses This review outlines the basis on which we should consider all respiratory viruses as aerosol-transmissible infections, in order to improve our control of these pathogens in both healthcare and community settings.

Recent Findings: We present recent studies to support the aerosol transmission of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, and some older studies to demonstrate the aerosol transmissibility of other, more familiar seasonal respiratory viruses.

Summary: Current knowledge on how these respiratory viruses are transmitted, and the way we control their spread, is changing.

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This is an account that should be heard of an important struggle: the struggle of a large group of experts who came together at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic to warn the world about the risk of airborne transmission and the consequences of ignoring it. We alerted the World Health Organization about the potential significance of the airborne transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and the urgent need to control it, but our concerns were dismissed. Here we describe how this happened and the consequences.

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Background: There are still uncertainties in our knowledge of the amount of SARS-CoV-2 virus present in the environment - where it can be found, and potential exposure determinants - limiting our ability to effectively model and compare interventions for risk management.

Aim: This study measured SARS-CoV-2 in three hospitals in Scotland on surfaces and in air, alongside ventilation and patient care activities.

Methods: Air sampling at 200 L/min for 20 min and surface sampling were performed in two wards designated to treat COVID-19-positive patients and two non-COVID-19 wards across three hospitals in November and December 2020.

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MGB-BP-3 is a potential first-in-class antibiotic, a Strathclyde Minor Groove Binder (S-MGB), that has successfully completed Phase IIa clinical trials for the treatment of associated disease. Its precise mechanism of action and the origin of limited activity against Gram-negative pathogens are relatively unknown. Herein, treatment with MGB-BP-3 alone significantly inhibited the bacterial growth of the Gram-positive, but not Gram-negative, bacteria as expected.

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Article Synopsis
  • * Historically, diseases were believed to be transmitted through the air via miasma theory, but this changed with germ theory, which identified various other transmission methods over time.
  • * Recent research, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic, has reaffirmed the importance of aerosol transmission, indicating that it could be a significant route for many respiratory infections, contrary to previous dominant beliefs.
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Background: The approval of ethanol by the Biocidal Products Regulation has been under evaluation since 2007. This follows concern over alcohol uptake from ethanol-based hand rubs (EBHR). If ethanol is classified as carcinogenic, mutagenic, or reprotoxic by the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA), then this would affect infection prevention and control practices.

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Environmental hygiene in hospitals is a major challenge worldwide. Low-resourced hospitals in African countries continue to rely on sodium hypochlorite (NaOCl) as major disinfectant. However, NaOCl has several limitations such as the need for daily dilution, irritation, and corrosion.

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Background: Patients undergoing bone marrow transplantation or chemotherapy for cancer are profoundly immunosuppressed. They are at risk for both endogenous and exogenous infections and require enhanced protection from infection while in hospital.

Objectives: The aim of this narrative review was to determine the optimal design features of bone marrow transplant (BMT) units for reducing infection risk in these vulnerable patients.

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