Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia was diagnosed by bronchoalveolar lavage of the upper lobes in a patient with the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) receiving aerosol pentamidine prophylaxis. Serendipitous availability of a normal premorbid lung gallium scan indicated that pneumocystosis had developed during aerosol pentamidine prophylaxis; at the time of presentation a repeat gallium scan...

BACKGROUND Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) patients are at increased risk for venous thromboembolism (VTE) compared to the general population. Practice guidelines recommend pharmacologic prophylaxis for IBD inpatients. AIM Our aim was to determine the rates of pharmacologic VTE prophylaxis in ulcerative colitis (UC) inpatients at a tertiary referral center. We also assessed potential predict...

OBJECTIVE Cytomegalovirus (CMV) retinitis is a relatively common opportunistic infection in late-stage HIV disease, causing significant morbidity and mortality. Prophylactic use of oral ganciclovir has recently been shown to decrease the incidence of CMV retinitis but is relatively expensive and may not be very well tolerated by many patients. We performed a decision analysis to assess the cost...

Cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection and disease, with its extensive direct and indirect consequences, adds considerably to the cost of patient management in both solid organ and bone marrow transplantation. Antiviral prophylaxis for CMV infection can offer cost advantages over preemptive therapy and "wait-and-treat" approaches. Valacyclovir has demonstrated efficacy for CMV prophylaxis in renal, he...

STUDY DESIGN Systematic review of the literature and analysis of pooled data. OBJECTIVES To better understand the incidence of thromboembolic disease in postoperative spinal patients, and to establish a starting point for defining appropriate postoperative prophylaxis protocols. SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA The risk of thromboembolic disease is well studied for some orthopedic procedures. How...

BACKGROUND Rabies, a 100% fatal disease claims more than 59,000 human lives every year globally. One human life is lost every 15 minutes due to this deadly preventable disease. Timely initiation of post exposure prophylaxis following an animal exposure can result in 100% preventability of this fatal disease. METHODOLOGY This facility based study was conducted among clinical fraternities of te...

We performed a retrospective study in order to clarify the risk of HBV-related liver disease in a large number of isolated anti-HBc positive patients undergoing chemoimmunosuppressive therapy for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. So far only limited case reports have been published about this issue and no data on HBV-related risk in this population was available. While the need of antiviral prophylaxis i...

OBJECTIVE To review guidelines for using antibiotic prophylaxis to prevent infective endocarditis, and to present recent changes and controversies regarding these guidelines. QUALITY OF EVIDENCE Data are from physiologic and in vitro studies, as well as studies of animal models, and from retrospective analyses of human endocarditis cases. Systematic reviews and guidelines are also examined. A...