Clinical significance of polymicrobial bacteremia in newborns.

Objective: To identify whether polymicrobial bacteremia in newborns is associated with any predisposing factors, distinguishing clinical features, or higher mortality.

Methods: Results of blood cultures obtained over a period of 1 year from neonates admitted to the paediatric ward and Neonatal Intensive Care Unit of a tertiary care hospital were retrospectively analysed. The study group included all cases with polymicrobial bacteremia (isolation of two or more organisms).

Growing skull fractures.

Growing skull fractures or craniocerebral erosions are rare sequel to cranial fractures where progressively growing cranial defects follow lacerations involving the duramater. Their usual site is the parietal region. They present as a cystic, non-tender swelling with an underlying palpable bony defect.

Bacteriological analysis of blood culture isolates from neonates in a tertiary care hospital in India.

This study was undertaken to determine the profile and antibiotic sensitivity patterns of aerobic isolates from blood cultures of neonates in a tertiary care hospital in New Delhi, India. All blood culture reports (n = 1,828), obtained during August 1995-September 1996 from newborns admitted to the Department of Pediatrics and the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at the University College of Medical Sciences and GTB Hospital, Delhi, were analyzed, and the sensitivity patterns were recorded. The positivity of blood culture was 42% (770/1,828).

Plantar response in infancy.

The objective of the study was to characterize the plantar response at various ages in infancy in Indian children. The subjects were 1281 apparently healthy children born at term and without any history suggestive of neurological disease, enrolled between the ages of 1 and 12 months. The plantar response was elicited in both feet by thumbnail drag method and graded as flexor, extensor and equivocal.