Osteomyelitis due to multiple carbapenemase-producing Gram-negative bacteria: The first case report of a GES-13-producing Pseudomonas aeruginosa isolate in Canada

A case of osteomyelitis in an infant following a burn injury sustained in Pakistan caused by a GES-13-producing Pseudomonas aeruginosa (the first reported in Canada) and an OXA-48 producing Klebsiella pneumoniae is described. The present case serves to highlight the importance of international travel as a risk factor for infection with carbapenemase-producing bacteria and the challenges in the laboratory detection of these organisms.     

Fault Detection and Safety in Closed-Loop Artificial Pancreas Systems

Continuous subcutaneous insulin infusion pumps and continuous glucose monitors enable individuals with type 1 diabetes to achieve tighter blood glucose control and are critical components in a closed-loop artificial pancreas. Insulin infusion sets can fail and continuous glucose monitor sensor signals can suffer from a variety of anomalies, including signal dropout and pressure-induced sensor attenuations. In addition to hardware-based failures, software and human-induced errors can cause safety-related problems. Techniques for fault detection, safety analyses, and remote monitoring techniques that have been applied in other industries and applications, such as chemical process plants and commercial aircraft, are discussed and placed in the context of a closed-loop artificial pancreas.     

百特泵持续静脉输注5-Fu联合化疗的护理

目的探讨百特泵持续静脉输注5-Fu联合化疗的近期疗效、不良反应和护理效果。方法将我院肿瘤科2011年3月至2013年11月接受百特泵持续静脉输注5-Fu和间歇静脉输注5-Fu两种联合化疗的病人分为治疗组和对照组,对比研究两组患者的满意度、疗效、体质状况、药物毒副反应间的差异。结果治疗组患者满意度、体质状况改善以及消化道反应和周围静脉炎的副作用较对照组减低,并有统计学意义(P<0.05);而在疗效、骨髓抑制和神经毒性方面无统计学差异(P>0.05)。结论百特泵持续静脉输注5-Fu联合化疗近期疗效满意,患者耐受性好,毒副反应减轻,化疗过程中须加强综合护理措施。     

Converging global crises are forcing the rapid adoption of disruptive changes in drug discovery

Spiralling research costs combined with urgent pressures from the Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and the consequences of climate disruption are forcing changes in drug discovery. Increasing the predictive power of in vitro human assays and using them earlier in discovery would refocus resources on more successful research strategies and reduce animal studies. Increasing laboratory automation enables effective social distancing for researchers, while allowing integrated data capture from remote laboratory networks. Such disruptive changes would not only enable more cost-effective drug discovery, but could also reduce the overall carbon footprint of discovering new drugs.     

Strategies to accelerate immune recovery after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation

The interplay existing between immune reconstitution and patient outcome has been extensively demonstrated in allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. One of the leading causes of infection-related mortality is the slow recovery of T-cell immunity due to the conditioning regimen and/or age-related thymus damage, poor naïve T-cell output, and restricted T-cell receptor (TCR) repertoires. With the aim of improving posttransplantation immune reconstitution, several immunotherapy approaches have been explored. Donor leukocyte infusions are widely used to accelerate immune recovery, but they carry the risk of provoking graft-versus-host disease. This review will focus on sophisticated strategies of thymus function-recovery, adoptive infusion of donor-derived, allodepleted T cells, T-cell lines/clones specific for life-threatening pathogens, regulatory T cells, and of T cells transduced with suicide genes.