Cleveland Clinic journal of medicine
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The care of patients during the COVID-19 pandemic has added many layers of complexity to ethical issues. Our response emphasizes the importance of having an ethically sound framework to inform our decisions, requiring caregivers to consider what is ethically optimal and feasible for the patient. It is increasingly important to understand the ethical principles and to appropriately apply them to both patient management decisions and guide scarce resource allocation. If we are to be prepared to face the many challenges of this pandemic, we must prioritize the ethical demands to our treatment and management concerns.
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Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI) is the most common cause of diarrhea in hospitalized patients and results in substantial morbidity, mortality, and costs. Its clinical management, primarily with antibiotics, is often complicated by recurrent episodes. These recurrent CDI episodes are thought to be caused by antibiotic disruption of colonic microbiota and usually occur within 4 weeks of completing antibiotic therapy. The risk of recurrent CDI increases after the first episode, creating a need for management strategies to diagnose, treat, and prevent these complications.