Incidence and risk factors for health care-associated pneumonia in a pediatric intensive care unit.

Objectives: To determine the incidence and risk factors for health care-associated pneumonia in a pediatric intensive care unit.

Design: Prospective cohort study.

Setting: Pediatric intensive care unit with 16 medical and surgical beds in a tertiary teaching hospital in Recife, northeast Brazil.

Association between Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis DNA in blood and cellular and humoral immune response in inflammatory bowel disease patients and controls.

Background: Similarities between human inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and ruminant paratuberculosis have fueled a heated discussion on the role of Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis (MAP) in the etiology of IBD.

Methods: In order to determine microbiological and immunological evidence of an association between MAP and IBD, blood from 222 inflammatory bowel disease patients and 80 healthy donors from the Basque Country (Spain) were subjected to nested PCR for MAP-specific insertion sequence IS900, interferon-gamma (IFN-gamma) release test with PPA-3 MAP antigen (IFNMAP) or phosphate-buffered saline (IFNPBS), and antibody ELISA with PPA-3 MAP antigen (ABMAP).

On the prevalence of M. avium subspecies paratuberculosis DNA in the blood of healthy individuals and patients with inflammatory bowel disease.

Background: Mycobacteria, such as M. leprae and M. tuberculosis infect billions of humans.

Reproductive biology and mating system estimates of two Andean melocacti, Melocactus schatzlii and M. andinus (Cactaceae).

Background And Aims: The genus Melocactus comprises 36 species of globose cacti with the most derived traits in the Cereeae tribe. It is the proper study system to examine what are the most derived reproductive strategies within that tribe. This study aims to characterize the reproductive biology and to estimate the mating system parameters of two Andean melocacti, Melocactus schatzlii and M.