Clinical infectious diseases : an official publication of the Infectious Diseases Society of America
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Ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) is considered to be an important cause of infection-related death and morbidity in intensive care units (ICUs). We sought to determine the long-term effect of an educational program to prevent VAP in a medical ICU (MICU). ⋯ A focused education intervention resulted in sustained reductions in the incidence of VAP, duration of hospital stay, cost of antibiotic therapy, and cost of hospitalization.
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We postulate that hypercytokinemia plays a role in immunopathogenesis of severe human influenza. ⋯ Hypercytokinemia (of proinflammatory and T helper 1 cytokines) is detected in severe influenza, correlating with clinical illness and virus concentration. Hyperactivation of phospho-p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase (in T helper cells) is possibly involved. Early viral suppression may attenuate these potentially deleterious cytokine responses.
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The increasingly daunting problem of antimicrobial resistance has led to an intense focus on optimization of antibiotic therapy, with simultaneous goals of improving patient outcomes and minimizing the contribution of that therapy to making the available antibiotics obsolete. Although even appropriate antibiotic therapy drives resistance, inappropriate therapy may also have adverse effects on the individual patient, as well as on the bacterial ecology. ⋯ Thus, the optimal approach to the critically ill patient with infection involves the initiation of aggressive broad-spectrum empirical therapy followed by timely responses to microbiological and clinical results as they become available. An appropriate response to this information often involves de-escalation of therapy or even its discontinuation.
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Letter Case Reports
Lack of cross-hepatotoxicity between voriconazole and posaconazole.