Management of Chronic Osteomyelitis and Antibiotic Stewardship; An Effort to Delay the Post-Antibiotic Era.

Objective: To develop an effective antimicrobial strategy for the management of chronic osteomyelitis.

Study Design: Observational study. Place and Duration of the Study: Departments of Microbiology and Orthopaedics, Combined Military Hospital Malir, Karachi, Pakistan, from January 2021 to February 2022.

No Simple Solutions to Complex Problems: Cognitive Science Principles Can Guide but Not Prescribe Educational Decisions.

Cognitive science of learning points to solutions for making use of existing study and instruction time more effectively and efficiently. However, solutions are not and cannot be one-size-fits-all. This paper outlines the danger of overreliance on specific strategies as one-size-fits-all recommendations and highlights instead the cognitive learning processes that facilitate meaningful and long-lasting learning.

Broader benefits of the pretesting effect: Placement matters.

Taking a test before learning new information in a lesson improves memory for that information - pretesting effect. Although the specific memory benefit of a pretest on pretested information has been well documented, it remains unclear what the circumstances necessary for the broader memory benefit are - that is, the benefit of a pretest on memory of information in the lesson that was not pretested. Sometimes this broader benefit is present, but other times it disappears or reverses.

Interleaving Retrieval Practice Promotes Science Learning.

Can interleaved retrieval practice enhance learning in classrooms? Across a 4-week period, ninth- through 12th-grade students ( = 155) took a weekly quiz in their science courses that tested half of the concepts taught that week. Questions on each quiz were either blocked by concept or interleaved with different concepts. A month after the final quiz, students were tested on the concepts covered in the 4-week period.

Frequency And Clinical Spectrum Of Multidrug Resistant Acinetobacter Baumannii As A Significant Nosocomial Pathogen In Intensive Care Unit Patients.

Background: Acinetobacter baumannii has emerged as one of the leading causes of multidrug resistant nosocomial infections worldwide. It is able to survive in hospital environment and build up diverse resistance mechanisms making it difficult to treat with current antibiotics. Objective: It was to determine the frequency and patterns of Acinetobacter baumannii in intensive care units (ICU) settings.

Reinfection or relapse of COVID-19 in health care workers; case series of 2 patients from Pakistan.

During an ongoing pandemic of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, main question which has arisen in everyone's mind is about the immune response that may protect from reinfection. Coronaviruses are known for short-term immunity. Their ability of mutations enables them to escape host immunity, thus increasing chances of reinfection.

Clinical and virological course of SARS-CoV 2 infected patients in a tertiary care hospital in Pakistan.

Background: Acute respiratory illness caused by Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) involved the whole globe within no time. Various studies published globally have shown variable severity of disease and mortality. The objective of our study was to describe clinical and epidemiological characteristics of the disease in our setup.

The interplay between inhibitory control and metaphor conventionality.

When a metaphor is first encountered (lawyers are sharks), several meanings are activated, but the literal ones (lawyers have fins) need to be inhibited to successfully compute the figurative meaning (lawyers are aggressive). With repeated exposure that metaphor becomes conventionalized, and its figurative meaning may be easily accessible without the need to inhibit the corresponding literal meaning. Thus, a central question in the field, and the objective of the current project, relates to how metaphor conventionality and inhibitory control contribute to metaphor comprehension.

Improving conceptual learning via pretests.

Although examples can be structured to emphasize diagnostic features of concepts, novice learners tend to focus on irrelevant surface features and struggle to encode deeper structures. Experiment 1 examined whether pretesting-answering questions about content before it is studied-could enhance learners' noticing of diagnostic features, making them easier to process during subsequent study. Participants studied statistical concepts with examples that emphasized surface details or deep structure, and then classified new examples of these concepts.

Learning from errors: students' and instructors' practices, attitudes, and beliefs.

In some educational contexts, such as during assessments, it is essential to avoid errors. In other contexts, however, generating an error can foster valuable learning opportunities. For instance, generating errors can improve memory for correct answers.

Optimizing the Efficacy of Learning Objectives through Pretests.

Learning objectives (LOs) are statements that typically precede a study session and describe the knowledge students should obtain by the end of the session. Despite their widespread use, limited research has investigated the effect of LOs on learning. In three laboratory experiments, we examined the extent to which LOs improve retention of information.

Wearable Devices for Ambulatory Cardiac Monitoring: JACC State-of-the-Art Review.

Ambulatory monitoring devices are enabling a new paradigm of health care by collecting and analyzing long-term data for reliable diagnostics. These devices are becoming increasingly popular for continuous monitoring of cardiac diseases. Recent advancements have enabled solutions that are both affordable and reliable, allowing monitoring of vulnerable populations from the comfort of their homes.

Self-regulated spacing in a massive open online course is related to better learning.

In this study, we examined students' natural studying behaviors in massive, open, online course (MOOC) on introductory psychology. We found that, overall, distributing study across multiple sessions-increasing spacing-was related to increased performance on end-of-unit quizzes, even when comparing the same student across different time-points in the course. Moreover, we found important variation on who is more likely to engage in spaced study and benefit from it.

Evaluation of direct drug susceptibility testing of blood culture isolates comparing it with conventional disk diffusion testing.

Objective: To evaluate a direct antibiotic susceptibility testing method for blood culture..

Methods: The cross-sectional comparative study was conducted at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, Rawalpindi, Pakistan, from December 2016 to October 2017.

Pattern of Blood Stream Infections and their antibiotic susceptibility profile in a Neonatal intensive care unit of a tertiary care hospital; a current perspective.

Objective: To determine the pattern of blood stream infections and their antibiotic susceptibility profile with infectivity predictors in a neonatal setting.

Methods: The descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, Rawalpindi, Pakistan, from December 1, 2016,to April 30, 2018, and comprised blood culture samples received in Bactec/BactAlert paediatric bottles from neonates aged 0-30 days admitted in the neonatal intensive care unit. The samples were processed as per the standard guidelines.

Utility of a Smartphone Based System (cvrPhone) to Predict Short-term Arrhythmia Susceptibility.

Repolarization alternans (RA) has been implicated in the pathogenesis of ventricular arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death. We developed a 12-lead, blue-tooth/Smart-Phone (Android) based electrocardiogram (ECG) acquisition and monitoring system (cvrPhone), and an application to estimate RA, in real-time. In in-vivo swine studies (N = 17), 12-lead ECG signals were recorded at baseline and following coronary artery occlusion.

Alveolar Iodine Tampon Packing Reduces Postoperative Morbidity After Third Molar Surgery.

Purpose: The aim of this study was to assess the efficacy of an iodine tampon after mandibular third molar surgery on oral health-related quality of life (OHRQoL), use of painkillers, postoperative sequelae, and self-care behaviors in the first postoperative week.

Materials And Methods: This prospective, crossover, randomized controlled study included patients undergoing surgical removal of bilateral symmetrically, horizontally impacted mandibular third molars. The surgical site was randomly allocated to receive an iodine tampon after surgery or wound closure and rinsing with a Monoject syringe (Tyco/Healthcare-Kendall, Mansfield, MA).

Utility of a smartphone based system (cvrphone) to accurately determine apneic events from electrocardiographic signals.

Background: Sleep disordered breathing manifested as sleep apnea (SA) is prevalent in the general population, and while it is associated with increased morbidity and mortality risk in some patient populations, it remains under-diagnosed. The objective of this study was to assess the accuracy of respiration-rate (RR) and tidal-volume (TV) estimation algorithms, from body-surface ECG signals, using a smartphone based ambulatory respiration monitoring system (cvrPhone).

Methods: Twelve lead ECG signals were collected using the cvrPhone from anesthetized and mechanically ventilated swine (n = 9).

Dengue fever in Punjab, Pakistan: Knowledge, perception and adaptation among urban adults.

Climate change and weather variations are strongly associated with the incidence of dengue fever, outbreak risk in Pakistan and other developing countries. Knowledge and adaptation measures can affect the incidence and outbreak risk of dengue fever. The present study attempted to determine the knowledge, perception and adaptation to dengue fever by the respondents in Faisalabad, Pakistan employing cross-sectional data.

Evaluation of a call center to assess post-discharge maternal and early neonatal outcomes of facility-based childbirth in Uttar Pradesh, India.

Background: Maternal and neonatal outcomes in the immediate post-delivery period are critical indicators of quality of care. Data on childbirth outcomes in low-income settings usually require home visits, which can be constrained by cost and access. We report on the use of a call center to measure post-discharge outcomes within a multi-site improvement study of facility-based childbirth in Uttar Pradesh, India.