Self-administered, remote assessment of SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence in health care workers.

Background: Our objective was to safely and remotely assess longitudinal SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence in at-risk health care workers at the onset of the epidemic.

Methods: Self-administered serologic testing was performed every 30 days up to 5 times using a point-of-care, lateral flow SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid IgG immunoassay in a cohort of at-risk health care workers (n = 339) and lower-risk controls (n = 100).

Results: Subjects were enrolled between 4/14/20-5/6/20 and most were clinicians (41%) or nurses (27%).

Candidal endocarditis presenting with bilateral lower limb ischemia.

The incidence of fungal endocarditis is increasing. While the pathogenic mechanisms are not fully understood, infection is associated with underlying heart disease and is most often attributable to Candida species. Candidal endocarditis complications include heart damage, inflammation, and emboli with resulting ischemia and tissue death.

SPARC regulates collagen interaction with cardiac fibroblast cell surfaces.

Cardiac tissue from mice that do not express secreted protein acidic and rich in cysteine (SPARC) have reduced amounts of insoluble collagen content at baseline and in response to pressure overload hypertrophy compared with wild-type (WT) mice. However, the cellular mechanism by which SPARC affects myocardial collagen is not clearly defined. Although expression of SPARC by cardiac myocytes has been detected in vitro, immunohistochemistry of hearts demonstrated SPARC staining primarily associated with interstitial fibroblastic cells.

Expression in SPARC-null mice of collagen type I lacking the globular domain of the α1(I) N-propeptide results in abdominal hernias and loss of dermal collagen.

The sequence encoding the N-propeptide of collagen I is characterized by significant conservation of amino acids across species; however, the function of the N-propeptide remains poorly defined. Studies in vitro have suggested that one activity of this propeptide might be to act as a feedback inhibitor of collagen I synthesis. To determine whether the N-propeptide contributed to decreased collagen content in SPARC-null mice, mice carrying a deletion of exon 2, which encodes the globular domain of the N-propeptide of collagen I, were crossed to SPARC-null animals.