Publications by authors named "Nathaniel R Poulin"
Background: No consensus exists regarding the definition of ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP). Even within a single institution, inconsistent diagnostic criteria result in conflicting rates of VAP. As a Level 1 trauma center participating in the Trauma Quality Improvement Project (TQIP) and the National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN), our institution showed inconsistencies in VAP rates depending on which criteria was applied.
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- - The study examines the effects of Airway Pressure Release Ventilation (APRV) compared to standard lung protective ventilation (ARDSNet) in swine models with concurrent lung and brain trauma, with the hypothesis that APRV may better alleviate injury progression.
- - Yorkshire swine were assigned to receive either APRV (9 swine), ARDSNet (12 swine), or a sham treatment, measuring various pulmonary and cerebral parameters over time.
- - Results indicated that although macroscopic and histopathological differences between the groups were minimal, microdialysis data suggested that the APRV group may experience increased ischemia in the brain compared to the ARDSNet group.
Background: Helicopter emergency medical service (HEMS) transport of trauma patients is costly and of unproven benefit. Recent retrospective studies fail to control for crew expertise and therefore compare highly trained advance life support with less-trained basic life support crews. The purpose of our study was to compare HEMS with ground, interfacility transport while controlling for crew training.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn glaucoma, retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) die by apoptosis, generally attributed to an elevated intraocular pressure (IOP). We now describe the impact of elevated IOP in the rat on expression of caspase 8 and caspase 9, initiators of the extrinsic and intrinsic caspase cascades, respectively. Activation of both caspases was demonstrated by the presence of cleaved forms of the caspases and the detection of cleaved Bid and PARP, downstream consequences of caspase activation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRetinal ganglion cells die by apoptosis after optic nerve crush. FK506 has been shown to be neuroprotective in this model but the mechanism(s) by which it exerts these actions remains unknown. We and others have shown that caspase 9 is cleaved in the retina in other injury models and we hypothesized that the neuroprotection observed with FK506 was mediated by interference with caspase 9 activation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose: We investigated retinal ganglion cell (RGC) death and activation of caspase 9 in rats with experimental glaucoma.
Methods: Elevated intraocular pressure (IOP) was induced in rats using the Morrison model. Surviving backlabeled RGC were counted and TUNEL staining detected apoptosis.