Brown Recluse Spider Bites in Patients With Neutropenia: A Single-institution Experience.

Brown recluse spider bites can cause local and systemic signs, including rash, dermonecrosis, edema, hemolysis, and acute kidney failure. These are mostly attributed to sphingomyelinase D, the main toxin. To evaluate the severity of the disease in pediatric patients with and without neutropenia, we retrospectively reviewed records of patients treated at St.

Use of Fungal Diagnostics and Therapy in Pediatric Cancer Patients in Resource-Limited Settings.

Fungal diseases are an important cause of mortality in immunocompromised hosts, and their incidence in pediatric cancer patients in low- to middle-income countries is underestimated. In this review, we present relevant, up-to-date information about the most common opportunistic and endemic fungal diseases among children with cancer, their geographic distribution, and recommended diagnostics and treatment. Efforts to improve the care of children with cancer and fungal disease must address the urgent need for sustainable and cost-effective solutions that improve training, fungal disease testing capability, and the use of available resources.

Challenges in managing infections among pediatric cancer patients: Suboptimal national essential medicines lists for low and middle income countries.

Infection management for pediatric cancer patients may be compromised in low and middle income countries (LMICs) if key antimicrobials are not included in national essential medicines lists. We screened national essential medicines lists for 81 LMICs, and assessed the frequency and corresponding 95% confidence limits (CL) of countries that included the 15 International Society of Paediatric Oncology-recommended antimicrobial agents. Only 19% (95% CL: 11%, 28%) of countries included all recommended antimicrobials in their national essential medicines lists.

Predictors of wait-time for antibiotic initiation and association of wait-time with hospital length of stay and ICU admission among children with cancer at the Southern Philippines Medical Center.

Background: Expedited antibiotic administration improves the survival of children with cancer and infection. A 1-hour antibiotic wait-time (AWT) post-hospital arrival is a quality-of-care bench mark in healthcare. However, multiple factors preclude achieving this goal in developing countries.