Effect of barcode technology on medication preparation safety: a quasi-experimental study.

Background: Medication errors are a common problem in hospitals and a major driver of adverse patient outcomes. Barcode verification technology is a promising strategy to help ensure safe medication preparation practices.

Objectives: The objectives of this study were (i) to assess the effects of a barcode-assisted medication preparation and administration system regarding the rate of medication preparation errors and (ii) to compare the time spent on medication preparation tasks by medical staff.

Estimation of Arterial Pulse Wave Velocity from Doppler Radar Measurements: a Feasibility Study.

Pulse wave velocity has emerged as important diagnostic parameter due to its association with various cardiovascular disorders, such as hypertension, vascular aging, and atherosclerosis. Long-term monitoring of pulse wave velocity can be beneficial in carrying out accurate diagnosis of the underlying conditions or even for an early prediction of cardiovascular diseases. Doppler radar has emerged as a promising technology for contact-less monitoring and assessment of physiological parameters.

[Closed-loop medication management: Results of a user survey].

Background: New technologies, such as bar-code scanning systems, have played a significant role in enhancing medication processes over recent years. Despite the documented benefits, integration, acceptance, and user opinion continue to play an important role in the successful implementation of such systems. To date no studies have been carried out in Switzerland to assess the attitude or acceptance of nurses towards electronically supported medication systems after implementation.

Toward a novel semi-invasive activation mapping tool for the diagnosis of supraventricular arrhythmias from the esophagus.

Aims: Supraventricular arrhythmia diagnosis using the surface electrocardiogram (sECG) is often cumbersome due to limited atrial signal quality. In some instances, use of esophageal electrocardiography (eECG) may facilitate the diagnosis. Here, we present a novel approach to reconstruct cardiac activation maps from eECG recordings.

Estimation of the Cardiac Field in the Esophagus Using a Multipolar Esophageal Catheter.

The rapid progress of invasive therapeutic options for cardiac arrhythmias increases the need for accurate diagnostics. The surface electrocardiogram (ECG) is still the standard of noninvasive diagnostics but lacks atrial signal resolution. By contrast, esophageal electrocardiography (EECG) yields atrial signals of high amplitude and with a high signal-to-noise ratio.

K-band Doppler radar for contact-less overnight sleep marker assessment: a pilot validation study.

An estimated 45 million persons in Europe are annually subjected to sleep-wake disorders. State-of-the-art polysomnography provides sophisticated insights into sleep (patho)physiology. A drawback of the method, however, is the obtrusive setting dependent on a clinical-based sleep laboratory with high operational costs.

[Frequency of medication preparation and medication administration errors in a Swiss university Hospital. A prospective observational study].

Background: Prospective observational studies from Swiss university hospitals, focusing on the frequency of medication preparation and medication administration errors using direct observation, are still missing. To close this gap, we have conducted a scientific evaluation of an electronically assisted medication preparation and administration process in a Swiss university hospital. Aim: The aim of this study was to measure the frequency of medication preparation and medication administration errors in two units in a Swiss university hospital before the implementation of an electronically assisted medication preparation and administration process.

Pseudo Asynchronous Level Crossing adc for ecg Signal Acquisition.

A new pseudo asynchronous level crossing analogue-to-digital converter (adc) architecture targeted for low-power, implantable, long-term biomedical sensing applications is presented. In contrast to most of the existing asynchronous level crossing adc designs, the proposed design has no digital-to-analogue converter (dac) and no continuous time comparators. Instead, the proposed architecture uses an analogue memory cell and dynamic comparators.

Markers for silent atrial fibrillation in esophageal long-term electrocardiography.

Purpose: Paroxysmal atrial fibrillation (PAF) often remains undiagnosed. Long-term surface ECG is used for screening, but has limitations. Esophageal ECG (eECG) allows recording high quality atrial signals, which were used to identify markers for PAF.

Freezing Equals Freezing? Performance of Two Cryoablation Devices in Concomitant Mitral Valve Repair.

 Recent guidelines have recommended the addition of ablation in cardiac surgery for patients presenting with atrial fibrillation (AF). Currently available cryoablation devices use either nitrous oxide or argon gas as cooling agent. Our study aimed to compare success rates of two different devices currently available on the market and applied during concomitant cardiac surgery.

Bufferless Compression of Asynchronously Sampled ECG Signals in Cubic Hermitian Vector Space.

Asynchronous level crossing sampling analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) are known to be more energy efficient and produce fewer samples than their equidistantly sampling counterparts. However, as the required threshold voltage is lowered, the number of samples and, in turn, the data rate and the energy consumed by the overall system increases. In this paper, we present a cubic Hermitian vector-based technique for online compression of asynchronously sampled electrocardiogram signals.

A Baseline Wander Tracking System for Artifact Rejection in Long-Term Electrocardiography.

Long-term electrocardiogram (ECG) signals might suffer from relevant baseline disturbances during physical activity. Motion artifacts in particular are more pronounced with dry surface or esophageal electrodes which are dedicated to prolonged ECG recording. In this paper we present a method called baseline wander tracking (BWT) that tracks and rejects strong baseline disturbances and avoids concurrent saturation of the analog front-end.

Graphics-processor-unit-based parallelization of optimized baseline wander filtering algorithms for long-term electrocardiography.

Long-term electrocardiogram (ECG) often suffers from relevant noise. Baseline wander in particular is pronounced in ECG recordings using dry or esophageal electrodes, which are dedicated for prolonged registration. While analog high-pass filters introduce phase distortions, reliable offline filtering of the baseline wander implies a computational burden that has to be put in relation to the increase in signal-to-baseline ratio (SBR).

An optimized lead system for long-term esophageal electrocardiography.

Long-term electrocardiography (ECG) featuring adequate atrial and ventricular signal quality is highly desirable. Routinely used surface leads are limited in atrial signal sensitivity and recording capability impeding complete ECG delineation, i.e.

Synthetic versus natural curcumin: bioequivalence in an in vitro oral mucositis model.

Background: Curcumin (CUR) is a dietary spice and food colorant (E100). Its potent anti-inflammatory activity by inhibiting the activation of Nuclear Factor-κB is well established.

Methods: The aim of this study was to compare natural purified CUR (nCUR) with synthetically manufactured CUR (sCUR) with respect to their capacity to inhibit detrimental effects in an in vitro model of oral mucositis.

Electrocardiographic ST-segment monitoring during controlled occlusion of coronary arteries.

Background: Ischemia monitoring cannot always be performed by 12-lead ECG. Hence, the individual performance of the ECG leads is crucial. No experimental data on the ECG's specificity for transient ischemia exist.

Electrodes for long-term esophageal electrocardiography.

The emerging application of long-term and high-quality ECG recording requires alternative electrodes to improve the signal quality and recording capability of surface skin electrodes. The esophageal ECG has the potential to overcome these limitations but necessitates novel recorder and lead designs. The electrode material is of particular interest, since the material has to ensure conflicting requirements like excellent biopotential recording properties and inertness.

The optimal lead insertion depth for esophageal ECG recordings with respect to atrial signal quality.

Background: Diagnosing supraventricular arrhythmias by conventional long-term ECG can be cumbersome because of poor p-waves. Esophageal long-term electrocardiography (eECG) has an excellent sensitivity for atrial signals and may overcome this limitation. However, the optimal lead insertion depth (OLID) is not known.

High-resolution esophageal long-term ECG allows detailed atrial wave morphology analysis in case of atrial ectopic beats.

Detection of arrhythmic atrial beats in surface ECGs can be challenging when they are masked by the R or T wave, or do not affect the RR-interval. Here, we present a solution using a high-resolution esophageal long-term ECG that offers a detailed view on the atrial electrical activity. The recorded ECG shows atrial ectopic beats with long coupling intervals, which can only be successfully classified using additional morphology criteria.

Prospective survey of antibiotic utilization in pediatric hospitalized patients to identify targets for improvement of prescription.

Background: The rise in the use of antibiotics has resulted in increasing health care costs and the emergence of resistant bacteria. Little is known about the general misuse of antibiotics in hospitalized children. We evaluated the utilization of antibiotics in a pediatric teaching hospital aiming to identify targets for improvement of prescription.

A comparison of BRCA1 mutation analysis by direct sequencing, SSCP and DHPLC.

The most sensitive screening technique for genes that predispose patients for particular cancers is direct sequencing. However, sequencing of complex genes is technically demanding, costly and time-consuming. We have tested alternate screening techniques to find a fast sensitive method for detecting alterations of DNA in the large BRCA1 gene prior to sequencing.

Interfacial adsorption and aggregation associated changes in secondary structure of human calcitonin monitored by ATR-FTIR spectroscopy.

The peptide hormone human calcitonin (hCT) has a marked tendency to aggregate in aqueous solutions, resulting in viscous and turbid dispersions consisting of long fibrils approximately 80 A in diameter. Both transmission (T-FTIR) and attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared (ATR-FTIR) experiments were applied on hCT adsorption and aggregation kinetics. By means of the surface sensitive ATR-FTIR spectroscopy at a hydrophobic/hydrophilic interface, early adsorption and aggregation steps of hCT could be followed in situ under real time conditions.