A Life Cycle Assessment of Reusable and Disposable Surgical Caps.

Introduction: Surgical cap attire plays an important role in creating a safe and sterile environment in procedural suites, thus the choice of reusable versus disposable caps has become an issue of much debate. Given the lack of evidence for differences in surgical site infection (SSI) risk between the two, selecting the cap option with a lower carbon footprint may reduce the environmental impact of surgical procedures. However, many institutions continue to recommend the use of disposable bouffant caps.

The Planetary Benefit of Suspending USMLE Step 2 CS: Estimating Carbon Emissions Associated with US Medical Students' Travel to Testing Centers.

: The discontinuation of the Step 2 Clinical Skills Exam (CS) by the United States Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE) eliminated the need for personal travel to testing centers. The carbon emissions associated with CS have not been previously quantified. : To estimate the annual carbon emissions generated by travel to CS Testing Centers (CSTCs) and to explore differences across geographic regions.

The Carbon Footprint of Residency Interview Travel.

Background: Over the last decade, medical student residency applicants have shown a substantial increase in the number of interviews attended, which is associated with a significant increase in travel. The carbon footprint associated with residency interviews has not been well documented prior to this investigation, and is a critical issue related to climate health.

Objective: The purpose of this study is to document the carbon footprint associated with travel to residency interviews of the applicants from a single institution.

A comparative carbon footprint analysis of disposable and reusable vaginal specula.

Background: Healthcare systems in the United States have increasingly turned toward the use of disposable medical equipment in an attempt to save time, lower costs, and reduce the transmission of infections. However, the use of disposable instruments is associated with increased solid waste production and may have negative impacts on the environment, such as increased greenhouse gas emissions.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to inform this discussion; we applied life cycle assessment methods to evaluate the carbon footprints of 3 vaginal specula: a single-use acrylic model and 2 reusable stainless steel models.

Brain Mechanisms of Attention Orienting Following Frustration: Associations With Irritability and Age in Youths.

Objective: Childhood irritability is a common, impairing problem with changing age-related manifestations that predict long-term adverse outcomes. However, more investigation of overall and age-specific neural correlates is needed. Because youths with irritability exhibit exaggerated responses to frustrating stimuli, the authors used a frustration functional MRI (fMRI) paradigm to examine associations between irritability and neural activation and tested the moderating effect of age.

Association of Irritability and Anxiety With the Neural Mechanisms of Implicit Face Emotion Processing in Youths With Psychopathology.

Importance: Psychiatric comorbidity complicates clinical care and confounds efforts to elucidate the pathophysiology of commonly occurring symptoms in youths. To our knowledge, few studies have simultaneously assessed the effect of 2 continuously distributed traits on brain-behavior relationships in children with psychopathology.

Objective: To determine shared and unique effects of 2 major dimensions of child psychopathology, irritability and anxiety, on neural responses to facial emotions during functional magnetic resonance imaging.

Management of acute anemia in a Jehovah's Witness patient with acute lymphoblastic leukemia with polymerized bovine hemoglobin-based oxygen carrier: a case report and review of literature.

Background: Management of severe symptomatic anemia is exceptionally challenging when blood transfusions cannot be administered. Use of hemoglobin (Hb)-based oxygen carriers as "bridging treatment" can be an option.

Case Report: This is a report of a 36-year-old Jehovah's Witness diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) who developed severe symptomatic anemia (Hb as low as 3.

Spontaneous intestinal perforation.

So much is unknown about SIP-its etiology, pathophysiology, best treatment modality, and outcome. Yet the incidence of SIP is increasing as more VLBW infants are surviving and since SIP has been identified as a separate disease from NEC. Because many cases present with an insidious onset, it is imperative that practitioners review all x-rays with SIP in mind.

Hyperparathyroidism accompanying multiple myeloma.

Hypercalcemia is a manifestation of a variety of both benign and malignant diseases. These conditions are not mutually exclusive, and we present a case report of a patient first diagnosed with the classic findings of multiple myeloma who, after appropriate therapy, demonstrated persistent hypercalcemia and was found on further testing to have an elevated parathormone level (PTH) and scintigraphic evidence of a benign parathyroid adenoma. Hypercalcemia responded to excision of the parathyroid adenoma.