Trichuris dolichotis Morini, Boero & Rodriguez, 1955 (Nematoda: Trichuridae) en Dolichotis patagonum (Zimmermann, 1780) (Rodentia: Caviidae) del centro para la conservación de fauna silvestre, San Juan, Argentina

In Argentina, there is one record of the nematode Trichuris dolichotis Morini, Boero & Rodriguez, 1955 (Nematoda: Trichuridae) parasitizing the mara Dolichotis patagonum (Zimmermann, 1780), which corresponds to its original description in 1955. In June 2023, at the Wildlife Rehabilitation Center, San Juan province, a specimen of mara male D. patagonum died and the necropsy´s results are under investigation at the moment. The post-mortem identified (n= 5) female nematodes of T. dolichotis in the intestine. In the present study we present the second record after 58 years of not reporting its presence, being the first record for the province of San Juan and the second for Argentina. The present work contributes to the knowledge of the mammalian parasite fauna of Argentina.En Argentina existe un registro del nemátodo Trichuris dolichotis Morini, Boero y Rodriguez, 1955 (Nematoda: Trichuridae) parasitando la mara Dolichotis patagonum (Zimmermann, 1780), la cual corresponde a su descripción original del año 1955. En junio del 2023, en el Centro de Rehabilitación de Fauna Silvestre, provincia de San Juan, un ejemplar de mara macho D. patagonum murió por causas que se investigan. Se procedió a realizar la necropsia correspondiente, identificando durante el proceso a nemátodos hembras (n= 5) de T. dolichotis en intestino. Nosotros en el presente estudio presentamos un segundo registro luego de 58 años de no reportar su presencia, siendo el primer registro para la provincia de San Juan y el segundo para Argentina. El presente trabajo contribuye al conocimiento de la fauna de parásitos de mamíferos de Argentina

Contribución al conocimiento de nemátodos parásitos en mamíferos de la provincia de San Juan, Argentina

The endoparasitic fauna of four mammal species was analyzed: Puma concolor (Linnaeus, 1771) (cougar), Lycalopex gymnocercus (Fischer, 1814) (grey fox), Myocastor coypus (Molina 1782) (coipus) and Tolypeutes matacus (Linnaeus, 1758) (armadillo). These specimens entered the Center for Wildlife Rehabilitation, Environmental Education and Responsible Recreation located in the province of San Juan, Argentina. Out of the four mammal species, three died on the spot. The necropsy of L. gymnocercus, M. coypus and T. matacus was carried out, and it was evidenced the presence of three species of parasitic nematodes: Physaloptera clausa Rudolphi, 1819 (Physalopteridae) in L. gymnocercus; Trichuris myocastoris Enigk, 1933 (Trichuridae) in M. coypus; and adult females of Aspidodera sp. Railliet & Henry, 1912 in T. matacus. Regarding P. concolor, the expulsion of nematodes was orally, determining the presence of Toxascaris sp. Linstow, 1902 larvae (Toxocaridae). Metric and morphological data of the evidenced nematodes are presented. The present work mentions four new parasite-host interactions for Argentina, and the first records for the province of San Juan, thus contributing to the knowledge of parasites in mammals.Analizamos la fauna endoparasitaria de cuatro especies de mamíferos; Puma concolor (Linnaeus, 1771) (puma), Lycalopex gymnocercus (Fischer, 1814) (zorro gris), Myocastor coypus (Molina, 1782) (coipus) y Tolypeutes matacus (Linnaeus, 1758) (armadillo de tres bandas) del Centro de Rehabilitación de Vida Silvestre, Educación Ambiental y Recreación Responsable en la provincia de San Juan, Argentina. De las cuatro especies de mamíferos que ingresaron al Centro de Rehabilitación, tres fallecieron en el lugar, posteriormente se procedió a realizar la necropsia. El análisis post mortem de L. gymnocercus, M. coypus y T. matacus evidencio la presencia de tres especies de nemátodos parásitos; Physaloptera clausa Rudolphi, 1819 (Physalopteridae) en L. gymnocercus, Trichuris myocastoris Enigk, 1933 (Trichuridae) en M. coypus, y hembras adultas de Aspidodera sp. Railliet & Henry, 1912 en T. matacus. Con respecto al P. concolor, expulsó los nemátodos por vía oral, determinándose la presencia de larvas de Toxascaris sp. Linstow, 190 (Toxocaridae). Se presentan datos métricos y morfológicos de los nemátodos. Nuestro trabajo menciona cuatro nuevas interacciones parásitos- hospedadores para Argentina y los primeros registros para la provincia de San Juan, contribuyendo de esta forma al conocimiento parasitario en mamíferos

Primer registro de infestación en un reptil por larvas de <i>Amblyomma parvitarsum</i> (Acari: Ixodidae) en Argentina

El parasitismo es una de las formas de vida más comunes en el reino animal, sin embargo, no debe ser visto solamente desde el punto de vista económico o de la salud. Los parásitos son excelentes indicadores ecológicos y aportan información de la relaciones filogenéticas con sus hospedadores. Dentro de la familia Ixodidae, el género Amblyomma está representado por aproximadamente 135 especies en todo el mundo. Estas garrapatas presentan un ciclo de vida de tres hospedadores, donde cada uno de los estadios parasíticos (larva, ninfa y adulto) utiliza hospedadores diferentes que pueden pertenecer o no a la misma especie. El presente trabajo menciona, por primera vez para Argentina, la presencia de larvas de Amblyomma parvitarsum parasitando al lagarto Liolaemus eleodori (Iguania: Liolaemidae) en una localidad de la provincia de San Juan. Párrafo extraído del texto a modo de resumenFacultad de Ciencias Naturales y Muse

The evolution of the ventilatory ratio is a prognostic factor in mechanically ventilated COVID-19 ARDS patients

Background: Mortality due to COVID-19 is high, especially in patients requiring mechanical ventilation. The purpose of the study is to investigate associations between mortality and variables measured during the first three days of mechanical ventilation in patients with COVID-19 intubated at ICU admission. Methods: Multicenter, observational, cohort study includes consecutive patients with COVID-19 admitted to 44 Spanish ICUs between February 25 and July 31, 2020, who required intubation at ICU admission and mechanical ventilation for more than three days. We collected demographic and clinical data prior to admission; information about clinical evolution at days 1 and 3 of mechanical ventilation; and outcomes. Results: Of the 2,095 patients with COVID-19 admitted to the ICU, 1,118 (53.3%) were intubated at day 1 and remained under mechanical ventilation at day three. From days 1 to 3, PaO2/FiO2 increased from 115.6 [80.0-171.2] to 180.0 [135.4-227.9] mmHg and the ventilatory ratio from 1.73 [1.33-2.25] to 1.96 [1.61-2.40]. In-hospital mortality was 38.7%. A higher increase between ICU admission and day 3 in the ventilatory ratio (OR 1.04 [CI 1.01-1.07], p = 0.030) and creatinine levels (OR 1.05 [CI 1.01-1.09], p = 0.005) and a lower increase in platelet counts (OR 0.96 [CI 0.93-1.00], p = 0.037) were independently associated with a higher risk of death. No association between mortality and the PaO2/FiO2 variation was observed (OR 0.99 [CI 0.95 to 1.02], p = 0.47). Conclusions: Higher ventilatory ratio and its increase at day 3 is associated with mortality in patients with COVID-19 receiving mechanical ventilation at ICU admission. No association was found in the PaO2/FiO2 variation

Contributions of mean and shape of blood pressure distribution to worldwide trends and variations in raised blood pressure: A pooled analysis of 1018 population-based measurement studies with 88.6 million participants

© The Author(s) 2018. Background: Change in the prevalence of raised blood pressure could be due to both shifts in the entire distribution of blood pressure (representing the combined effects of public health interventions and secular trends) and changes in its high-blood-pressure tail (representing successful clinical interventions to control blood pressure in the hypertensive population). Our aim was to quantify the contributions of these two phenomena to the worldwide trends in the prevalence of raised blood pressure. Methods: We pooled 1018 population-based studies with blood pressure measurements on 88.6 million participants from 1985 to 2016. We first calculated mean systolic blood pressure (SBP), mean diastolic blood pressure (DBP) and prevalence of raised blood pressure by sex and 10-year age group from 20-29 years to 70-79 years in each study, taking into account complex survey design and survey sample weights, where relevant. We used a linear mixed effect model to quantify the association between (probittransformed) prevalence of raised blood pressure and age-group- and sex-specific mean blood pressure. We calculated the contributions of change in mean SBP and DBP, and of change in the prevalence-mean association, to the change in prevalence of raised blood pressure. Results: In 2005-16, at the same level of population mean SBP and DBP, men and women in South Asia and in Central Asia, the Middle East and North Africa would have the highest prevalence of raised blood pressure, and men and women in the highincome Asia Pacific and high-income Western regions would have the lowest. In most region-sex-age groups where the prevalence of raised blood pressure declined, one half or more of the decline was due to the decline in mean blood pressure. Where prevalence of raised blood pressure has increased, the change was entirely driven by increasing mean blood pressure, offset partly by the change in the prevalence-mean association. Conclusions: Change in mean blood pressure is the main driver of the worldwide change in the prevalence of raised blood pressure, but change in the high-blood-pressure tail of the distribution has also contributed to the change in prevalence, especially in older age groups

Bipolar multiplex families have an increased burden of common risk variants for psychiatric disorders.

Multiplex families with a high prevalence of a psychiatric disorder are often examined to identify rare genetic variants with large effect sizes. In the present study, we analysed whether the risk for bipolar disorder (BD) in BD multiplex families is influenced by common genetic variants. Furthermore, we investigated whether this risk is conferred mainly by BD-specific risk variants or by variants also associated with the susceptibility to schizophrenia or major depression. In total, 395 individuals from 33 Andalusian BD multiplex families (166 BD, 78 major depressive disorder, 151 unaffected) as well as 438 subjects from an independent, BD case/control cohort (161 unrelated BD, 277 unrelated controls) were analysed. Polygenic risk scores (PRS) for BD, schizophrenia (SCZ), and major depression were calculated and compared between the cohorts. Both the familial BD cases and unaffected family members had higher PRS for all three psychiatric disorders than the independent controls, with BD and SCZ being significant after correction for multiple testing, suggesting a high baseline risk for several psychiatric disorders in the families. Moreover, familial BD cases showed significantly higher BD PRS than unaffected family members and unrelated BD cases. A plausible hypothesis is that, in multiplex families with a general increase in risk for psychiatric disease, BD development is attributable to a high burden of common variants that confer a specific risk for BD. The present analyses demonstrated that common genetic risk variants for psychiatric disorders are likely to contribute to the high incidence of affective psychiatric disorders in the multiplex families. However, the PRS explained only part of the observed phenotypic variance, and rare variants might have also contributed to disease development

Heterogeneous contributions of change in population distribution of body mass index to change in obesity and underweight NCD Risk Factor Collaboration (NCD-RisC)

From 1985 to 2016, the prevalence of underweight decreased, and that of obesity and severe obesity increased, in most regions, with significant variation in the magnitude of these changes across regions. We investigated how much change in mean body mass index (BMI) explains changes in the prevalence of underweight, obesity, and severe obesity in different regions using data from 2896 population-based studies with 187 million participants. Changes in the prevalence of underweight and total obesity, and to a lesser extent severe obesity, are largely driven by shifts in the distribution of BMI, with smaller contributions from changes in the shape of the distribution. In East and Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, the underweight tail of the BMI distribution was left behind as the distribution shifted. There is a need for policies that address all forms of malnutrition by making healthy foods accessible and affordable, while restricting unhealthy foods through fiscal and regulatory restrictions

Worldwide trends in hypertension prevalence and progress in treatment and control from 1990 to 2019: a pooled analysis of 1201 population-representative studies with 104 million participants

Background Hypertension can be detected at the primary health-care level and low-cost treatments can effectively control hypertension. We aimed to measure the prevalence of hypertension and progress in its detection, treatment, and control from 1990 to 2019 for 200 countries and territories. Methods We used data from 1990 to 2019 on people aged 30–79 years from population-representative studies with measurement of blood pressure and data on blood pressure treatment. We defined hypertension as having systolic blood pressure 140 mm Hg or greater, diastolic blood pressure 90 mm Hg or greater, or taking medication for hypertension. We applied a Bayesian hierarchical model to estimate the prevalence of hypertension and the proportion of people with hypertension who had a previous diagnosis (detection), who were taking medication for hypertension (treatment), and whose hypertension was controlled to below 140/90 mm Hg (control). The model allowed for trends over time to be non-linear and to vary by age. Findings The number of people aged 30–79 years with hypertension doubled from 1990 to 2019, from 331 (95% credible interval 306–359) million women and 317 (292–344) million men in 1990 to 626 (584–668) million women and 652 (604–698) million men in 2019, despite stable global age-standardised prevalence. In 2019, age-standardised hypertension prevalence was lowest in Canada and Peru for both men and women; in Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, and some countries in western Europe including Switzerland, Spain, and the UK for women; and in several low-income and middle-income countries such as Eritrea, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, and Solomon Islands for men. Hypertension prevalence surpassed 50% for women in two countries and men in nine countries, in central and eastern Europe, central Asia, Oceania, and Latin America. Globally, 59% (55–62) of women and 49% (46–52) of men with hypertension reported a previous diagnosis of hypertension in 2019, and 47% (43–51) of women and 38% (35–41) of men were treated. Control rates among people with hypertension in 2019 were 23% (20–27) for women and 18% (16–21) for men. In 2019, treatment and control rates were highest in South Korea, Canada, and Iceland (treatment >70%; control >50%), followed by the USA, Costa Rica, Germany, Portugal, and Taiwan. Treatment rates were less than 25% for women and less than 20% for men in Nepal, Indonesia, and some countries in sub-Saharan Africa and Oceania. Control rates were below 10% for women and men in these countries and for men in some countries in north Africa, central and south Asia, and eastern Europe. Treatment and control rates have improved in most countries since 1990, but we found little change in most countries in sub-Saharan Africa and Oceania. Improvements were largest in high-income countries, central Europe, and some upper-middle-income and recently high-income countries including Costa Rica, Taiwan, Kazakhstan, South Africa, Brazil, Chile, Turkey, and Iran. Interpretation Improvements in the detection, treatment, and control of hypertension have varied substantially across countries, with some middle-income countries now outperforming most high-income nations. The dual approach of reducing hypertension prevalence through primary prevention and enhancing its treatment and control is achievable not only in high-income countries but also in low-income and middle-income settings

Prevalence, associated factors and outcomes of pressure injuries in adult intensive care unit patients: the DecubICUs study

Funder: European Society of Intensive Care Medicine; doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100013347Funder: Flemish Society for Critical Care NursesAbstract: Purpose: Intensive care unit (ICU) patients are particularly susceptible to developing pressure injuries. Epidemiologic data is however unavailable. We aimed to provide an international picture of the extent of pressure injuries and factors associated with ICU-acquired pressure injuries in adult ICU patients. Methods: International 1-day point-prevalence study; follow-up for outcome assessment until hospital discharge (maximum 12 weeks). Factors associated with ICU-acquired pressure injury and hospital mortality were assessed by generalised linear mixed-effects regression analysis. Results: Data from 13,254 patients in 1117 ICUs (90 countries) revealed 6747 pressure injuries; 3997 (59.2%) were ICU-acquired. Overall prevalence was 26.6% (95% confidence interval [CI] 25.9–27.3). ICU-acquired prevalence was 16.2% (95% CI 15.6–16.8). Sacrum (37%) and heels (19.5%) were most affected. Factors independently associated with ICU-acquired pressure injuries were older age, male sex, being underweight, emergency surgery, higher Simplified Acute Physiology Score II, Braden score 3 days, comorbidities (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, immunodeficiency), organ support (renal replacement, mechanical ventilation on ICU admission), and being in a low or lower-middle income-economy. Gradually increasing associations with mortality were identified for increasing severity of pressure injury: stage I (odds ratio [OR] 1.5; 95% CI 1.2–1.8), stage II (OR 1.6; 95% CI 1.4–1.9), and stage III or worse (OR 2.8; 95% CI 2.3–3.3). Conclusion: Pressure injuries are common in adult ICU patients. ICU-acquired pressure injuries are associated with mainly intrinsic factors and mortality. Optimal care standards, increased awareness, appropriate resource allocation, and further research into optimal prevention are pivotal to tackle this important patient safety threat