Infectious Disease
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Caregivers and Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Interventions
A Cochrane Review regarding efficacy of mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) for family caregivers of dementia patients revealed low-quality evidence that MBSR reduces short-term anxiety and depressive symptoms in this population.
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Hormone Therapy and Mortality: No Overall Effect?
An evaluation of outcomes of users and nonusers of postmenopausal hormonal therapy followed longitudinally in the Danish database showed no overall difference in mortality.
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Are Stethoscopes a Vector for Transmission to Patients?
An iconic symbol of medicine, the stethoscope can serve as a fomite to transmit pathogens from patient to patient if infection control procedures are not followed, researchers report. -
Improving Infection Prevention by Reforming IT, Electronic Health Records
The challenge to improve the functionality and ease of appropriate use of electronic health records (EHRs) and health information technology (IT) was recently outlined in a draft document by the Department of Health and Human Services. In submitted comments on the draft, the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology outlined some of the challenges IPs face in dealing with EHRs and IT. -
Study Finds Only 12.8% of Outpatient Antibiotics Appropriate
While hospitals are trying to rein in antibiotic use, outpatient settings are on the frontier of sorts in the effort to stop the rise of multidrug-resistant bacteria and their possible consequence: untreatable infections. -
NIH Super Sleuths Track Down a Rare Human Pathogen
An outbreak of a rare human pathogen — which was traced to the stagnant water in a newly constructed building a decade earlier — was solved by investigators at the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center using a deep bank of isolates and cutting-edge molecular epidemiology. -
U.S. Caregiver Received Experimental Ebola Vaccine Post Exposure
An American caregiver exposed to the Ebola virus while caring for a patient in Africa was given the new experimental vaccine within 24 hours and subsequently did not develop infection. As is often the case with diseases calling for post-exposure prophylaxis, it cannot be determined whether the vaccine prevented infection or whether the patient would not have developed Ebola regardless. -
CDC Analysis Supports Mandated Drug Stewardship in Hospitals
A new analysis of the immense societal costs of Clostridioides difficile infection may spur the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to finalize a regulation requiring antibiotic stewardship in hospitals.
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Infectious Disease Alert Updates
Jump in Cocci Cases, Winter 2017; Who Knew the Ink Was Not Sterile? Homeless Population Requires Hepatitis A Vaccination
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IV to Oral Conversion of Antibiotic Therapy for Bacteremia Due to Enterobacteriaceae
Oral step-down antibiotic therapy (IV to oral conversion) is safe and effective in patients with bloodstream infection due to Enterobacteriaceae.