Invasive fungal infections (IFIs) are among the life-threatening issues in patients with impaired immune system. High administration of antifungals in these patients imposes a heavy economic burden on the national health system. In addition, despite the usually expensive antifungal regimens, the mortality rate due to fungal infections is still high, resulting in the loss of hundreds of lives pe...

Procalcitonin (PCT) can discriminate bacterial from viral systemic infections and true bacteremia from contaminated blood cultures. The aim of this study was to evaluate PCT diagnostic accuracy in discriminating Gram-positive, Gram-negative, and fungal bloodstream infections. A total of 1,949 samples from patients with suspected bloodstream infections were included in the study. Median PCT valu...

Some mycoses are endemic. They develop through hematogenous spread, causing a generalized infection, usually with secondary mucosal involvement.The aim of this observational and retrospective study was to report the prevalence characteristics oral lesions in patients diagnosed systemic fungal infections (SFI) over 25-year period southern Brazil. Demographic (age, sex, ethnicity, occupation) cli...

OBJECTIVE Infections remain an important complication of left ventricular assist device (LVAD) support. While relatively uncommon, fungal infections present a serious concern given a high association with adverse events including death. We sought to further characterize the epidemiology of fungemias during LVAD support. METHODS Retrospective review of 292 patients receiving LVAD support from ...

The opportunistic fungus Candida albicans is one of the leading causes of infections in immunocompromised patients, and innate immunity provides a principal mechanism for protection from the pathogen. In the present work, the role of integrin α(X)β₂ in the pathogenesis of fungal infection was assessed. Both purified α(X)β₂ and α(X)β₂-expressing human epithelial kidney 293 cells recognized and b...

INTRODUCTION Patients are at increased risk of cutaneous and systemic fungal infections when immunocompromised secondary to chemotherapy administration, hematopoietic and solid organ transplantation, diabetes, and AIDS. Those infections caused by Candida species are increasing in severity and frequency. Yarrowia lipolytica, formerly termed Candida lipolytica, has only recently been implicated a...