BACKGROUND Spinal cord abscesses and spinal subdural empyemas are rare and difficult to treat. CASE DESCRIPTION A 35-year-old male presented to an outside institution with 2 months of progressive low back pain, weakness, and bowel incontinence; he was diagnosed with an L4 epidural abscess that was poorly managed. When the patient presented to our institution, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) ...

We describe a bioluminescent assay for gentamicin in serum that is applicable to the measurement of other aminoglycosides as well. The assay is based on the measurement of residual ATP with the luciferase reaction after incubation of the antibiotic with a plasmid-coded enzyme. Two aminoglycoside-inactivating enzymes were used: an adenylytransferase and an acetyltransferase coupled to S-acetyl c...

A 56-year-old woman had conductive keratoplasty (CK) for residual hyperopia and astigmatism. Three years before the procedure, the patient had arcuate keratotomy, followed by laser in situ keratomileusis 2 years later for high astigmatism correction in both eyes. During CK, a corneal perforation occurred in the right eye; during the postoperative examination, an iris perforation and anterior su...

Acute bacterial cystitis This disease is present when more than 100,000 bacteria are present in 1mL of fresh urine. Patients with acute cystitis may present with disease of varying degrees of severity; In women, associated haemorrhage is common. IVU results are typically normal. However, in severe cases, generalized bullous mucosal edema may cause the bladder wall to have a cobblestone appearan...

Pulmonary abnormalities may persist long after the acute phase of legionnaires disease (LD). In a cohort of 122 survivors of an outbreak of LD, 57% were still experiencing an increased number of symptoms associated with dyspnea at a mean of 16 months after recovery from acute-phase LD. For 86 of these patients, additional evaluation involving high-resolution computed tomography (HRCT) of the lu...

In a study designed to show whether purulent bronchial secretions damage the lung reversibly or irreversibly, 18 patients with bronchiectasis underwent lung function tests before and after two weeks' antibiotic treatment to convert their sputum from purulent to mucoid, and 10 of them also after four months' treatment. After two weeks FEV1, forced vital capacity, vital capacity, functional resid...

Condensins play a key role in the global organization of bacterial chromosomes. In Escherichia coli, the inactivation of its sole condensin MukBEF induces severe growth defects and renders cells hypersusceptible to novobiocin. We report here that this hypersusceptibility can be observed in TolC-deficient cells and is therefore unrelated to multidrug efflux. We further show that mutations in Muk...

High concentrations of residual arsanilic acid occur in pig manure due to its use in feed to promote growth and control diseases. This study compared the effects of arsanilic acid at three concentrations (0, 325, and 650mg/kg dry pig manure) on the abundance of antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) and the microbial community during anaerobic digestion. Addition of 650mg/kg arsanilic acid enhanced...

We report the case of a 20-year-old woman who had percutaneous closure of a patent ductus arteriosus (PDA) with a 17-mm Rashkind occluder when she was 4 years of age. A small residual shunt was noted on color-flow Doppler echocardiography immediately after the procedure and at 6-month follow-up. Because of the lack of hemodynamic complications, no additional intervention was performed. Sixteen ...

In this study we analyzed the characteristics of patients with pleural effusion secondary to Streptococcus milleri studied retrospectively between January and March 2013 and found seven patients with a mean age of 60 years, 43% of which were smokers and 57% with a drinking habit. The most common associated factors were alcoholism, previous pneumonia and diabetes. Other bacteria were identified ...