Number Of Intensive Care Unit Admissions Research Articles

Can Interactions between Timing of Vaccine-Altered Influenza Pandemic Waves and Seasonality in Influenza Complications Lead to More Severe Outcomes?

Vaccination can delay the peak of a pandemic influenza wave by reducing the number of individuals initially susceptible to influenza infection. Emerging evidence indicates that susceptibility to severe secondary bacterial infections following a primary influenza infection may vary seasonally, with peak susceptibility occurring in winter. Taken together, these two observations suggest that vaccinating to prevent a fall pandemic wave might delay it long enough to inadvertently increase influenza infections in winter, when primary influenza infection is more likely to cause severe outcomes. This could potentially cause a net increase in severe outcomes. Most pandemic models implicitly assume that the probability of severe outcomes does not vary seasonally and hence cannot capture this effect. Here we show that the probability of intensive care unit (ICU) admission per influenza infection in the 2009 H1N1 pandemic followed a seasonal pattern. We combine this with an influenza transmission model to investigate conditions under which a vaccination program could inadvertently shift influenza susceptibility to months where the risk of ICU admission due to influenza is higher. We find that vaccination in advance of a fall pandemic wave can actually increase the number of ICU admissions in situations where antigenic drift is sufficiently rapid or where importation of a cross-reactive strain is possible. Moreover, this effect is stronger for vaccination programs that prevent more primary influenza infections. Sensitivity analysis indicates several mechanisms that may cause this effect. We also find that the predicted number of ICU admissions changes dramatically depending on whether the probability of ICU admission varies seasonally, or whether it is held constant. These results suggest that pandemic planning should explore the potential interactions between seasonally varying susceptibility to severe influenza outcomes and the timing of vaccine-altered pandemic influenza waves.

Acompanhante de adulto na Unidade de Terapia Intensiva: uma visão do paciente

OBJETIVO: identificar se o cliente adulto gostaria de ter um acompanhante enquanto internado na Unidade de Terapia Intensiva (UTI) e relacionar a sua opinião com as variáveis sexo, idade, estado civil, escolaridade, gravidade da doença, tempo de internação e número de vezes que permaneceu em uma UTI. MÉTODOS: o instrumento utilizado foi um formulário aplicado por meio de entrevista com pacientes que ficaram internados na UTI por um período mínimo de 24 horas. A amostra constituiu-se de 138 pacientes. RESULTADOS: dos participantes do estudo 44.9% eram do sexo feminino e 55.1% do sexo masculino sendo que 58.7% concordaram e 41.3% não concordaram com a permanência de um acompanhante. A correlação entre as variáveis mostrou significância entre desejar a presença de acompanhante e o número de vezes de internação em UTI (p= 0.03). Houve também significância entre querer acompanhante e ser do sexo feminino (p = 0.051). Nas demais variáveis não tiveram significância. CONCLUSÃO: este estudo mostrou a necessidade de perguntar ao doente se deseja um acompanhante e em que momento da internação.

Clinical significance of tolerant strains of Staphylococcus aureus in patients with endocarditis.

We have studied 50 cases of endocarditis and 54 cases of bacteremia due to Staphylococcus aureus to ascertain the clinical significance of the newly described phenomenon of tolerance. In 32 of the patients with endocarditis and 35 of those with bacteremia strains were classified as tolerant (minimum bactericidal concentration/minimum inhibitory concentration greater than or equal to 16). Patients with endocarditis due to a tolerant strain responded less favorably than did patients with a sensitive strain. A larger number of patients with a tolerant strain had prolonged fever (58% versus 19%), a higher mean number of complications (1.6 versus 0.73), a greater number of intensive-care unit admissions (66% versus 33%), and a higher mortality (25% versus 11%). In contrast there was no difference in response to therapy in bacteremic patients without endocarditis having sensitive and tolerant strains. We conclude that infection with a tolerant organism adversely influences the outcome of staphylococcal endocarditis.