Background: Single-center studies have reported low yield of blood culture for skin and soft tissue infections (SSTIs) in children. Blood cultures are commonly obtained in cases of SSTI, though the degree of practice variation is uncertain. Study objectives include: 1) assess the degree of variation in rate of blood culture for SSTIs among children’s hospitals [...]

Background: There are 400,000 cases and 30,000 deaths from Clostridium difficile (C. diff) infections in the United States annually. Efforts to reduce the transmission of C. diff have focused on patients with diarrhea, however, many patients with C. diff are carriers who do not have symptoms. Because they are not isolated, carriers serve as a [...]

Case Presentation: After suffering a left-sided middle cerebral artery stroke and subsequent right sided weakness, an 85-year-old female fell and sustained a fracture of her right intertrochanteric femur. She initially had an ORIF at an outside hospital, but this subsequently failed and the patient had continued pain. She had repeat x-ray imaging of her femur [...]

Case Presentation: A fifteen-year-old previously healthy male presented with one and a half months of intermittent right upper quadrant pain with one month of decreased appetite and weight loss. He was followed by his primary care physician who initiated an outpatient workup approximately two weeks into his disease course. A CT scan of the abdomen [...]

Case Presentation: Anaplasmosis phagocytophilum is a rare, emerging tick borne illness transmitted by the Ixodes Scapularis tick endemic to the North Central and Northeastern United States. With an incidence of 6.1 cases per million in 2010, patients often present with nonspecific symptoms such as fever, leukopenia, thrombocytopenia, and transamintis. Cases outside of endemic areas are [...]

Case Presentation: A previously healthy 56-year-old female with mitral valve prolapse presented to a Georgia hospital with several days of headache and chest pain. Six weeks prior to admission (PTA), she visited her family ranch in west Texas for three weeks. One week PTA, she developed fever, myalgias, fatigue, and pleuritic chest pain. Her chest [...]

Case Presentation: A 52-year-old male presented to the emergency department multiple times the month prior to admission with progressively worsening right ankle and wrist pain, generalized myalgia, fatigue and worsening hoarseness of voice. His past medical history was notable for acute lymphoblastic leukemia (in remission for 2 years) complicated by aspergillus pneumonia. On the presentation [...]

Case Presentation: We present a case of a 27-year-old male with no significant past medical history who presented with a three week history of fever, sore throat, persistent non-productive cough, arthralgia, myalgia, as well as a diffuse body rash.A month prior to this presentation, he had seen his primary provider for a lump that he [...]

Case Presentation: A 55 year-old Korean male with a past medical history of hypertension and hyperlipidemia presented to the Emergency Department after feeling short of breath with chest pain, palpitations, mottled skin and blue lips. He endorsed five days of fever, headache, shortness of breath, abdominal pain and nausea. He denied recent travel and sick [...]

Case Presentation: A 29-year-old male presented to our hospital with four weeks of worsening fatigue, shortness of breath and a 15lb weight loss due to anorexia. He was short of breath walking up a single flight of stairs, which resolved with rest. He had no environmental exposures, sick contacts or recent travel. His mother had [...]