Publications by authors named "Harshini Asogan"
Reviewing fluid balance charts is a simple and effective method of assessing and monitoring the hydration status of patients. Several articles report that these charts are often either inaccurately or incompletely filled thereby limiting their usefulness in clinical practice. We had a similar experience in our practice at Kettering General Hospital and conducted a quality improvement project with a goal to increase the number of charts that were completely and accurately filled by a minimum of 50% in a 1-month period and to reassess the sustainability of this improvement after 6 months.
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- A study in Oman aimed to estimate the prevalence of health care associated methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (HA-MRSA) by collecting nasal swabs and cell phone swabs from medical students and healthcare providers.
- Out of 311 participants, 15.1% had nasal colonization with HA-MRSA, and 9.0% of cell phone surfaces tested positive for HA-MRSA, with 1.6% showing positive results in both nasal and phone samples.
- The study found high antibiotic resistance rates, with 48% resistant to erythromycin and 29% resistant to clindamycin, but no significant correlations were observed between HA-MRSA presence and demographic or health-related risk factors.
Background: The prevalence of community-associated methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus [CA-MRSA] is unknown in Oman.
Methods: Nasal and cell phones swabs were collected from hospital visitors and health-care workers on sterile polyester swabs and directly inoculated onto a mannitol salt agar containing oxacillin, allowing growth of methicillin-resistant microorganisms. Antibiotic susceptibility tests were performed using Kirby Bauer's disc diffusion method on the isolates.