Background: Urinary catheters, vascular catheters, and wounds such as pressure injuries are often hidden from view under gowns and sheets – out of sight, out of mind – contributing to prolonged catheter use, infections, delayed interventions, and diagnostic errors for symptoms (e.g., fever, delirium) related to catheters and wounds. We developed and pilot tested a [...]

Background: Patients admitted to New Hanover Regional Medical Center with a history of opiate use disorder (OUD) and serious infections require a median length of stay (LOS) of 33 days and discharge against medical advice (AMA) 26% of the time, resulting in quality and safety gaps which includes incomplete treatment, readmissions, and high cost of [...]

Background: Skin, soft tissue, and joint infections are common in pediatric patients and can require invasive procedures to drain purulent fluid. Atypical pathogens (fungal and acid-fast bacilli [AFB]) are important but rare causes of these infections with reported case rates as low as 0.6-1.6 cases/100,000 a year. Despite the rarity of these infections, costly atypical [...]

Background: Orbital cellulitis/abscess (OC) is an infection of eye tissues posterior to the orbital septum. OC can have significant morbidities such as vision loss, cavernous sinus thrombosis, and intracranial infection if treatment is not initiated promptly. While some patients with orbital cellulitis complicated by subperiosteal abscess require surgical drainage, many are managed with intravenous (IV) [...]

Background: Digital bedside information displays can alert clinicians about patient safety hazards, but the unintended consequences of these interventions are not well understood. Introducing new digital interventions may have implications for clinician satisfaction with the electronic environment, clinical team communication, and patient-centered care. Toward greater understanding of these unintended consequences, we described the content, form, [...]

Background: The Center for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 1.7 million patients per year develop hospital-associated infections (HAI), of whom 99,000 die. HAIs financially impact the United States healthcare system with an estimated cost of $6 billion per year. At Platte Valley Medical Center (PVMC) in 2013, the urinary catheter utilization ratio and rates [...]

Background: TOUR™ is a multicenter study designed to characterize the real-world population characteristics and clinical outcomes associated with telavancin (TLV) use through retrospective medical chart review. Telavancin is a lipoglycopeptide antibacterial active against gram-positive pathogens, including methicillin-sensitive and -resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MSSA and MRSA). In the US, TLV is approved for hospital-acquired (HABP) and ventilator-associated [...]

Background: Pneumocystis pneumonia (PCP) is a life-threatening opportunistic infection that leads to severe pneumonia in immunocompromised hosts. This results in respiratory failure and hypoxemia. Its reported survival rate ranges from 20% to 50%. Despite its seriousness, there is limited research on the occurrence of PCP in children, likely due to its infrequency. Current national data [...]

Background: Despite detailed Infectious Disease Society of America (IDSA) skin and soft tissue infection guidelines, patients with cellulitis at our institution consistently receive antibiotics with high local resistance or that are inappropriate based on IDSA guidelines. Our baseline data showed that 55 percent of patients receive antibiotics per IDSA guidelines and only 33 percent of [...]

Background: Foot amputation rates in Black patients with diabetic foot complications have been historically higher than White patients. To determine if improvements in this disparity occurred, we carried out trend analysis of lower extremity amputation rates for patients hospitalized with diabetic foot ulcers and infections (DFU/Is). Methods: Using the National Inpatient Sample database, we conducted [...]