BACKGROUND An antibiogram (ABG) gives the results of in vitro susceptibility tests performed on a pathogen isolated from a culture of a sample taken from blood or other tissues. The institutional cross-ABG consists of the conditional probability of susceptibility for pairs of antimicrobials. This paper explores how interpretative reading of the isolate ABG can be used to replace and improve the...

BACKGROUND A hip replacement with a cemented or cementless femoral stem produces an effect on the bone called adaptive remodelling, attributable to mechanical and biological factors. All of the cementless prostheses designs try to achieve an optimal load transfer in order to avoid stress-shielding, which produces an osteopenia.Long-term densitometric studies taken after implanting ABG-I and ABG...

OBJECTIVE To compare the hearing results in patients with otosclerosis who underwent a stapedotomy with either a platinum wire prosthesis or a commercially available, heat-activated nitinol stapes piston prosthesis. DESIGN Retrospective medical chart review. SETTING Academic tertiary care medical center. PATIENTS Seventy-nine consecutive patients diagnosed as having otosclerosis who under...

BACKGROUND Assessing the ventilatory status of non-intubated infants in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) is a constant challenge. Methods to evaluate ventilation include arterial blood gas analysis (ABG), which is invasive and intermittent, and transcutaneous carbon dioxide monitoring (PtcCO2), which, while non-invasive, is also intermittent. A method that is non-invasive and continuous...

BACKGROUND Electrolyte values are measured both by arterial blood gas (ABG) analyzers and central laboratory auto-analyzers (AA), but a significant time gap exists between the availability of both these results, with the ABG giving faster results than the AA. The authors hypothesized that there is no difference between the results obtained after measurement of electrolytes by the blood gas and ...

Over the last 20 years, the number of stapes operations performed has decreased steadily. This inadequate exposure to stapes surgery poses problems for both trainees and trainers. We retrospectively reviewed the outcomes of stapedotomy performed by a young physician at the ENT Clinic of the "A. Gemelli" Hospital of Rome. We used the technique of "one-shot" CO2 Laser stapedotomy using a titanium...

AIMS To investigate the correlation of pH, partial pressure of oxygen (PO2), partial pressure of carbon dioxide (PCO2), base excess (BE), and bicarbonate (HCO3) between arterial (ABG), venous (VBG), and capillary (CBG) blood gases. METHODS Patients admitted to the paediatric intensive care unit (PICU) in Cukurova University between August 2000 and February 2002 were enrolled. RESULTS A tota...

OBJECTIVES To analyze frequency-specific hearing results after surgery for chronic ear diseases while considering pathological findings and various surgical factors. METHODS Patients who underwent surgical management of chronic otitis media were reviewed retrospectively (n=559). Using pure tone audiometry, air conduction (AC), bone conduction (BC), and air bone gap (ABG) change between pre- a...

BACKGROUND Acinetobacter species are the leading cause of bloodstream infection (BSI), but their correct identification is challenging. We evaluated the matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization-time of flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS)-based VITEK MS (bioMérieux, France), and two automated systems, VITEK 2 (bioMérieux) and MicroScan (Siemens, USA) for identification of Acinetobacter BS...

This study was done to compare the pre and post-operative hearing results in patients undergoing canal wall down mastoidectomy with classical type III tympanoplasty using temporalis fascia alone. Patients of >or=5 years age with the diagnosis of Chronic otitis media (squamous) with conductive or mixed hearing loss, needing canal wall down mastoidectomy and with intact and mobile stapes suprastr...