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These guidelines update the 2013 “Updated US Public Health Service (PHS) Guidelines for the Management of Occupational Exposures to Human Immunodeficiency Virus and Recommendations for Postexposure Prophylaxis,” hereafter referred to as the 2013 PHS Guidelines.1,2 The availability of new medication options, new information on the window of detection for different human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) tests, and the risk of transmission from people with undetectable viral loads prompted this update. The primary intended audience for these recommendations remains anyone involved in the provision of HIV post-exposure management to healthcare personnel (HCP).
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention assembled a working group of representatives from federal agencies in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) who identified the priority topics for update and conducted systematic literature reviews to formulate recommendations (see Appendix). All recommendations were reviewed by the Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee (HICPAC) at public meetings, and by a non-consensus forming panel of external experts. New evidence-based recommendations are developed using the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) framework and classified according to the HICPAC recommendation scheme when evidence supported recommendation development.3,4 Other recommendations in this document are classified as good practice statements according to the criteria set forth by GRADE.5 The working group solicited additional feedback on recommendations from relevant agencies, subject-matter experts, and the public.
Recommendations that have changed since the 2013 PHS guidelines include:
new antiretroviral drug regimens for post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP);
a shortened duration of post-exposure follow-up HIV testing;
elimination of routine laboratory tests for antiretroviral drug toxicity; and
considerations for PEP for HCP with exposures to source patients with undetectable viral loads.
Important strategies in the principles of exposure management remain: primary prevention strategies; the prompt reporting and management of occupational exposures; adherence to recommended HIV PEP regimens when indicated; the role of expert consultation in management of exposures; and follow-up of exposed HCP.
Recent changes to US research funding are having far-reaching consequences that imperil the integrity of science and the provision of care to vulnerable populations. Resisting these changes, the BJPsych Portfolio reaffirms its commitment to publishing mental science and advancing psychiatric knowledge that improves the mental health of one and all.
Sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors reduce cardiovascular outcomes in patients with congestive heart failure and a biventricular circulation. Congestive heart failure in Fontan univentricular circulation is distinctly different. Experience with sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors in this group has not yet been well described.
Objectives:
This work describes safety and tolerability of sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors in patients with Fontan circulation.
Methods:
Single-centre review of patients with Fontan circulation prescribed a sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors for congestive heart failure. Primary outcome was tolerability or need for discontinuation. Secondary outcomes were changes in New York Heart Association class, congestive heart failure hospitalisation, ventricular function, exercise performance, and laboratory values.
Results:
We identified 25 patients with Fontan circulation prescribed an sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors, most with a systemic right ventricle. Over a third of subjects had at least moderately reduced baseline ventricular function. Baseline catheterisation showed a mean Fontan pressure of 17.1 ± 3.7 mmHg and pulmonary capillary wedge pressure 11.7 ± 3.2 mmHg at rest; 59% had occult diastolic dysfunction with abnormal pulmonary capillary wedge pressure elevation following volume expansion. Most were on congestive heart failure medications and/or a pulmonary vasodilator prior to sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors addition, and three had a congestive heart failure hospitalisation within the previous year. All reported good medication tolerance except one patient was nonadherent to medications and two discontinued sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors for perceived side effects. There were no significant differences in secondary outcomes. There was, however, a downward trend of serum brain natriuretic peptide (n = 13) and improved peak VO2 (n = 6), though neither statistically significant (p > 0.05).
Conclusion:
This series, the largest published to date, suggests that sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors are safe and tolerable congestive heart failure therapy in Fontan circulation. Further research is warranted to explore therapy in this unique population.
Housing is an environmental social determinant of health that is linked to mortality and clinical outcomes. We developed a lexicon of housing-related concepts and rule-based natural language processing methods for identifying these housing-related concepts within clinical text. We piloted our methods on several test cohorts: a synthetic cohort generated by ChatGPT for initial infrastructure testing, a cohort with substance use disorders (SUD), and a cohort diagnosed with problems related to housing and economic circumstances (HEC). Our methods successfully identified housing concepts in our ChatGPT notes (recall = 1.0, precision = 1.0), our SUD population (recall = 0.9798, precision = 0.9898), and our HEC population (recall = N/A, precision = 0.9160).
This paper describes the implementation of curricula for Liberia's first-ever psychiatry training programme in 2019 and the actions of the only two Liberian psychiatrists in the country at the time in developing and executing a first-year postgraduate psychiatry training programme (i.e. residency) with support from international collaborators. It explores cultural differences in training models among collaborators and strategies to synergise them best. It highlights the assessment of trainees’ (residents’) basic knowledge on entry into the programme and how it guided immediate and short-term priority teaching objectives, including integrated training in neuroscience and neurology. The paper describes the strengths and challenges of this approach as well as opportunities for continued growth.
In situ elemental imaging of planetary surface regolith at a spatial resolution of 100s to 1000s of microns can provide evidence of the provenance of rocks or sediments and their habitability, and can identify post-depositional diagenetic alteration affecting preservation. We use high-resolution elemental maps and XRF spectra from MapX, a flight prototype in situ X-ray imaging instrument, to demonstrate this technology in rock types relevant to astrobiology. Examples are given for various petrologies and depositional/diagenetic environments, including ultramafic/mafic rocks, serpentinites, hydrothermal carbonates, evaporites, stromatolitic cherts and diagenetic concretions.
We examined the association between multidrug resistance and socioeconomic status (SES), analyzing microbiological and ZIP-code–level socioeconomic data. Using generalized linear models, we determined that multidrug resistance is significantly and persistently more prevalent in samples taken from patients residing in low-income ZIP codes versus high-income ZIP codes in North Carolina.
In total, 50 healthcare facilities completed a survey in 2021 to characterize changes in infection prevention and control and antibiotic stewardship practices. Notable findings include sustained surveillance for multidrug-resistant organisms but decreased use of human resource-intensive interventions compared to previous surveys in 2013 and 2018 conducted prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Despite recent guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) allowing institutions to relax in-facility masking strategies and due to our evolving understanding of respiratory pathogen transmission during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, we propose an updated standard for universal precautions in healthcare settings: permanently including universal masking in routine patient-care interactions. Such a practice prioritizes safety for patients, healthcare providers (HCPs), and visitors.
Presenting the findings of a major Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) project into urban austerity governance in eight cities across the world, this book offers comparative reflections on the myriad experiences of collaborative governance and its limitations.
Conodonts were a highly diverse and abundant vertebrate group whose fossils are found in marine Paleozoic and Triassic strata around the world. They inhabited environments ranging from lagoons to open oceans and are represented by a wide variety of dental morphologies. Conodonts may have filled many different ecological niches and represent a significant proportion of nekton before the Devonian. Despite this, very little is known about trophic ecology of conodonts. While morphological diversity suggests a complex trophic structure within conodont communities, there is little evidence to support dietary niche partitioning among conodonts.
We tested the hypothesis that individual conodont taxa occupied different trophic niches, using Sr/Ca and Ba/Ca ratios preserved in the dental elements of assemblages from Silurian strata of Gotland, Sweden. Sr/Ca and Ba/Ca have been shown to vary in vertebrate skeletal tissues depending on trophic positioning, although biological and environmental conditions can affect these ratios. Environmental influences were minimized by examining entire conodont communities from a tropical epeiric sea and by measuring strontium isotope ratios using thermal ionization mass spectrometry in the most metropolitan taxon (Ozarkodina confluens). Composition of white matter, a tissue unique to conodonts, was also analyzed using microprobe analysis, revealing significantly lower Sr concentrations than in surrounding lamellar tissue, suggesting taxon-specific histology should be considered when analyzing conodonts for geochemical data. Excluding taxa with highly variable quantities of white matter, the results show that each taxon preserves different Sr/Ca and Ba/Ca ratios with limited overlap, indicating variation in trophic positioning.
Despite extensive paleoenvironmental research on the postglacial history of the Kenai Peninsula, Alaska, uncertainties remain regarding the region's deglaciation, vegetation development, and past hydroclimate. To elucidate this complex environmental history, we present new proxy datasets from Hidden and Kelly lakes, located in the eastern Kenai lowlands at the foot of the Kenai Mountains, including sedimentological properties (magnetic susceptibility, organic matter, grain size, and biogenic silica), pollen and macrofossils, diatom assemblages, and diatom oxygen isotopes. We use a simple hydrologic and isotope mass balance model to constrain interpretations of the diatom oxygen isotope data. Results reveal that glacier ice retreated from Hidden Lake's headwaters by ca. 13.1 cal ka BP, and that groundwater was an important component of Kelly Lake's hydrologic budget in the Early Holocene. As the forest developed and the climate became wetter in the Middle to Late Holocene, Kelly Lake reached or exceeded its modern level. In the last ca. 75 years, rising temperature caused rapid changes in biogenic silica content and diatom oxygen isotope values. Our findings demonstrate the utility of mass balance modeling to constrain interpretations of paleolimnologic oxygen isotope data, and that groundwater can exert a strong influence on lake water isotopes, potentially confounding interpretations of regional climate.
To analyze the frequency and rates of community respiratory virus infections detected in patients at the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center (NIHCC) between January 2015 and March 2021, comparing the trends before and during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.
Methods:
We conducted a retrospective study comparing frequency and rates of community respiratory viruses detected in NIHCC patients between January 2015 and March 2021. Test results from nasopharyngeal swabs and washes, bronchoalveolar lavages, and bronchial washes were included in this study. Results from viral-challenge studies and repeated positives were excluded. A quantitative data analysis was completed using cross tabulations. Comparisons were performed using mixed models, applying the Dunnett correction for multiplicity.
Results:
Frequency of all respiratory pathogens declined from an annual range of 0.88%–1.97% between January 2015 and March 2020 to 0.29% between April 2020 and March 2021. Individual viral pathogens declined sharply in frequency during the same period, with no cases of influenza A/B orparainfluenza and 1 case of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). Rhino/enterovirusdetection continued, but with a substantially lower frequency of 4.27% between April 2020 and March 2021, compared with an annual range of 8.65%–18.28% between January 2015 and March 2020.
Conclusions:
The decrease in viral respiratory infections detected in NIHCC patients during the pandemic was likely due to the layered COVID-19 prevention and mitigation measures implemented in the community and the hospital. Hospitals should consider continuing the use of nonpharmaceutical interventions in the future to prevent nosocomial transmission of respiratory viruses during times of high community viral load.
Our book details and documents the impact of austerity governance on a selection of cities. Yet for some commentators, cities and urban spaces remain the ‘new theatres of struggle’ in our contemporary condition (Hamel, 2014). This chapter critically assesses the forms of social and political resistance that emerged across the eight cities in our study. Building on themes introduced in Chapters 1 and 2, it argues that cities serve as crucibles for a diverse set of political contestations, responses and initiatives, but they exhibit differential capacities to shape their environments. Indeed, it demonstrates the complex ‘mix’ of political traditions, institutions, socio-economic structures, practices and ideological systems that come together to constitute the city as a political engine. In so doing, we draw particular attention to the shifting locus of resistance to austerity across communities and neighbourhoods. Our analysis and evaluation suggest that the future projection of cities as ‘spaces of hope’ rests on the twin challenges of ‘scaling up’ neighbourhood protests into broad and anti-systemic political projects, while reinvesting in the construction of progressive relations with the local state that open local spaces of manoeuvre to challenge national regimes of austerity.
Against this background, we turn first to our initial presentation and discussion of the eight cities, focusing on Melbourne, Barcelona and Nantes, whose distinctive characteristics provide the parameters for the analysis of all the cases. We then examine and describe the cases of Athens, Baltimore, Dublin, Leicester and Montréal, analysed here as in Chapter 1 through the lens of austerity realism. Finally, we focus on the cities of Barcelona and Nantes, which we deem to be exemplary cases of cities that have most contributed to social and political change, both in terms of the development of creative governance arrangements, and with respect to the social movements and political groups that have emerged within and beyond the official spaces of politics. Our characterization and evaluation establish the potentials, limits and contingency of new urban struggles and politics, whose forms are shaped by a concatenation of variables at multiple levels of analysis, and we conclude by setting out the challenges faced by these incipient and in many cases fleeting forms.
The reality of austerity in our eight case study cities and elsewhere has been strongly shaped by a phenomenon, long studied by geographers and recognized across the social sciences as well as by practitioners in policy making, politics and activism: social, political and institutional spaces are structured through a hierarchy of spatial scales that is not pregiven but socially constructed. Emphasizing scale in this manner confirms an intuitive assumption we make on a daily basis – when we go to work from our home, or when we go on vacation – that ‘spaces across the world differ from one another’ (Brenner, 2009: 27). What might sound trivial, is an important marker in the way we understand the world around us. How, then, does scale matter specifically? We all know the concept of scale from the ways we use a map or a measuring tape. In this colloquial usage, we presuppose that there is a natural quality to the concept: we rely on its truth as given. If you use a map for a cycling trip, and its scale tells you that one centimetre on the map represents ten kilometres, you assume that if you plan a trip represented by five centimetres on the map, it means that the distance you will travel is, in fact, 50 kilometres in reality (never mind the hills and valleys).
While this ‘natural’ understanding of scale underlies its use in this chapter, we add to it the notion that scale in social life is, for the most part, not a given but socially constructed. Being part of the general vocabulary with which we seek to understand the uneven spatial development of modern society, scale reveals its true explanatory power when we realize that it is a plastic concept that is subject to interpretation and negotiation. When we use scale in this manner, we refer to ‘the vertical differentiation of social relations among, for instance, global, supranational, national, regional, urban and/or local levels’ (Brenner, 2009: 31). We say: scale is socially constructed and use participles such as ‘scaling’ or ‘rescaling’ to refer to the more or less intentional activity to shape this ‘vertical differentiation.’ Political decision makers and activists refer to the scale of government at which they want their action to count: the nation state, the region, the county, the municipality.