Diagnostic microbiology and infectious disease
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Diagn. Microbiol. Infect. Dis. · Jun 2008
Comparison of usefulness of plasma procalcitonin and C-reactive protein measurements for estimation of severity in adults with community-acquired pneumonia.
Although procalcitonin (PCT) measurement has been performed in patients with infectious diseases, there are few reports on its usefulness in community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) associated with systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS). We investigated 88 patients who visited the internal medicine departments of Nagasaki University Hospital, Nagasaki, Japan, and its 11 affiliated hospitals in Japan because of CAP with or without SIRS. ⋯ In addition, 93.3% (28/30) of patients with mild CAP had negative PCT, and 48.3% (28/58) of patients positive for PCT had moderate or severe CAP. Our findings suggest that PCT level might be more useful for estimating CAP severity than CRP level at the 1st visit.
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Diagn. Microbiol. Infect. Dis. · Jun 2008
Antimicrobial susceptibility of Pseudomonas aeruginosa isolates obtained from patients in Canadian intensive care units as part of the Canadian National Intensive Care Unit study.
The antimicrobial susceptibility profile of 419 clinical isolates of Pseudomonas aeruginosa obtained from intensive care unit patients was determined. Amikacin and piperacillin/tazobactam were the most active antimicrobials evaluated. Fifty isolates (11.9%) were resistant to antimicrobials from > or =3 classes. Ninety-six percent of multidrug-resistant (MDR) isolates remained fully susceptible to colistin (polymyxin E).