Utilizing Data and Alarm Champions to Enhance Alarm Management: A Pediatric Quality Improvement Initiative.

Background: Nuisance and false alarms distract clinicians from urgent alerts, raising patient safety risks.

Local Problem: High alarm rates in a pediatric progressive care unit resulted in experiencing 180-250 alarms per day or 1 alarm every 3 to 4 minutes per clinician.

Methods: Through Plan-Do-Study-Act cycles, environmental, policy, and technology changes were implemented to decrease the average alarms/day/bed and percentage of time in alarm.

An In-Depth Look at Nutrition Support and Adequacy for Critically Ill Children with Organ Dysfunction.

Patients admitted to a pediatric intensive care unit (PICU) need individualized nutrition support that is tailored to their particular disease severity, nutritional status, and therapeutic interventions. We aim to evaluate how calories and proteins are provided during the first seven days of hospitalization for children in critical condition with organ dysfunction (OD). A single-center retrospective cohort study of children aged 2-18 years, mechanically ventilated > 48 h, and admitted > 7 days to a PICU from 2016 to 2017 was carried out.

Degos disease: A radiological-pathological correlation of the neuroradiological aspects of the disease.

Malignant atrophic papulosis (Degos disease) is an unusual thrombotic microangiopathy of uncertain etiology. The disease characteristically involves the skin and internal organs, with nervous system involvement more common in children. We present a case with diverse neurological manifestations including cranial nerve palsies, gait instability, and urinary incontinence.

A decade of pediatric tracheostomies: Indications, outcomes, and long-term prognosis.

Objective: To define the mortality and long-term outcomes of children undergoing tracheostomy.

Design: Retrospective chart and Texas Department of Health Bureau of Vital Statistics review of patients admitted to a Pediatric Intensive Care Unit who underwent a tracheostomy between 2001 and 2011. Mortality and decannulation rates were compared based on tracheostomy indication and age.

Integrated management of childhood illness: an emphasis on the management of infectious diseases.

The Integrated Management of Childhood Illness (IMCI) strategy has helped strengthen the application and expand coverage of key child survival interventions aimed at preventing deaths from infectious disease, respiratory illness, and malnutrition, whether at the health services, in the community, or at home. IMCI covers the prevention, treatment, and follow-up of the leading causes of mortality, which are responsible for at least two-thirds of deaths of children younger than 5 years in the countries of the Americas. The IMCI clinical guidelines take an evidence-based, syndrome approach to case managment that supports the rational, effective, and affordable use of drugs and diagnostic tools.

Nitric oxide.

Nitric oxide (NO) is a gas that is involved in many biologic processes. It is synthesized, by the NO synthases. The synthesis of NO by vascular endothelium is responsible for the vasodilator tone.

Tracheitis in pediatric patients.

Despite the advances that have been achieved in supportive pediatric intensive care, tracheitis remains a significant cause of reversible upper-airway obstruction in pediatric patients. This discussion highlights the epidemiology and clinical presentation of tracheitis in the twenty-first century and reviews diagnostic and therapeutic modalities. The gold standard for therapy remains supportive airway management in conjunction with appropriate antibiotic therapy.

Recurrent conjunctivitis as a presentation of munchausen syndrome by proxy.

Purpose: To report a case of Munchausen syndrome by proxy, which manifested as recurrent bilateral keratoconjunctivitis in an infant.

Design: Interventional case report.

Intervention: The patient underwent numerous diagnostic studies, including two endoscopies, skin biopsy, conjunctival pH measurement, and a skeletal survey.

Pediatric septic shock: why has mortality decreased?-the utility of goal-directed therapy.

Mortality from septic shock in children has decreased by 92 percent in the last 36 years. The contributions of goal-directed therapy, intensive care, and other forms of support are responsible for this decrease. A deeper and more specific understanding of innate immunity and the biomolecular processes that operate in septic shock has offered the scientific basis to implement goal-directed therapies.