Validation of entrustable professional activities for use in neonatal care residency programs.

Objective: Define and develop a set of entrustable professional activities (EPAs) to link clinical training and assessment of the hospital components of neonatal care in neonatology medical residency programs.

Methods: An exploratory study was conducted in two phases using a modified Delphi approach. In the first phase, a committee of five neonatology residency program coordinators drafted an initial set of EPAs based on the national matrix of competencies and on EPAs defined by international organizations.

The use of reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) for the rapid detection and identification of dengue virus in an endemic region: a validation study.

Dengue is the most important arboviral disease worldwide. Dengue diagnosis is usually made by serology, but serological techniques do not identify the infecting strain, and are only useful late in the course of infection. Several reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) protocols have been described for dengue diagnosis but none of them has been used on a regular basis.