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Paired blood cultures more sensitive for candidaemia than single cultures
October 16 2018
Guidelines (such as the UK SMI, updated Aug 2018) often recommend taking two sets of blood cultures from different body sites, but this is not always achieved in practice for practical reasons. Dr Taraj and colleagues in New Delhi (India) provide evidence supporting the use of paired blood samples, which increased the yield of most Candida species from the blood of hospital patients without substantially increasing the false positive rate.
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Gilead reduces price of AmBisome (liposomal amphotericin B) for cryptococcal meningitis in HIV/AIDS
September 28 2018
Gilead Sciences have expanded their access initiative for AmBisome to include cryptococcal meningitis. Governments and public sector agencies in 116 low-/middle-income countries can now buy it for US$16.25 per 50 mg vial.
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Combined therapy for at least two weeks recommended for fungal laryngitis
September 27 2018
Fungal infection is a rare but serious cause of laryngitis. Kunel’skaya and colleagues at Moscow Health Department (Russia) describe a study of 100 patients with laryngitis caused by either Candida (98%) or Aspergillus (2%). They recommend treatment with both a topical treatment (clotrimazole or miramistin) and a systemic antifungal for at least two weeks, with follow-up examinations at 3-monthly intervals.
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Trucut needle biopsy used to diagnose rectal Basidiobolus infection mimicking neoplasm in children
September 06 2018
Al-Helal and colleagues in Saudi Arabia recently reported the use of Trucut needle biopsy to diagnose rectal basidiobolomycosis in four paediatric cases where endoscopy had been inconclusive
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Histoplasmosis competes with TB as top killer of Latin American AIDS patients
August 30 2018
Adenis and colleagues in France modelled the annual incidence and deaths from tuberculosis and histoplasmosis among Latin American HIV/AIDS patients. Overall, they estimated 6710 histoplasmosis deaths versus 5062 tuberculosis deaths. In some countries more than 40% of subjects showed previous exposure to Histoplasma capsulatum.
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