Should you treat carriers of pharyngeal group A strep?

The jury is out as to whether you should treat asymptomatic carriers of group A streptococci (GAS), because no studies specifically address the issue. In addition, many patients are unlikely to care about their carrier status, although they probably care about symptoms and treatment side effects. Nonetheless, you may want to consider treating GAS carriers under the certain circumstances (strength of recommendation [SOR]: C, expert opinion)

B10: Controlling saltwater intrusion: aiding the recovery of freshwater ecosystems

As sea levels rise, it is imperative to understand the effects of saltwater intrusion on freshwater ecosystems. This is especially true in the coastal wetlands of the SE US, where freshwater forests are dying from exposure to salinity. One management strategy that could prevent salinity intrusion in surface waters are water control structures (WCS). The Great Reserve, located outside of Georgetown, SC, represents a biodiverse freshwater forested wetland affected by saltwater intrusion from the adjacent tidal Black River. Several years ago, scientists and landowners observed the degradation of the ecosystem. The owners of the property installed a WCS at the outflow of the Black River to mitigate and reduce the saltwater intrusion. This project provided a unique opportunity to study how the installation of a WCS affects the growth of forest tree species. Seven 25 m x 50 m forested plots were established in the Great Reserve. Trees greater than 10 cm diameter at breast height (DBH) within each plot were tagged and measured. Yearly growth rates were calculated based on the increment changes in DBH. The number of tree species varied between plots. The plot closest to the Black River only had 1 species (cypress), while the furthest plot had 4 tree species. While diversity did not change during the study, average growth rates did. Cypress trees in all plots had increased growth rates after the installation of the WCS. Cypress trees close to the river increased nearly 3-fold (0.09 cm/yr to 0.26 cm/yr based on DBH). As a reference, we compared these growth rates to cypress trees in another impacted wetland system without a WCS. Fewer tree species and more standing dead trees closer to the WCS illustrates the impact of salinity on the Great Reserve. The increase in cypress growth rate after the installation of the WCS is likely due to a reduction of salinity entering during the tidal cycle. This indicates the potential recovery of these freshwater ecosystems. If trees continue to respond positively, the construction of WCS should be promoted to other private landowners for the widespread conservation of freshwater wetlands

Modeling Bioretention Cells Using STELLA

2012 S.C. Water Resources Conference - Exploring Opportunities for Collaborative Water Research, Policy and Managemen

Watershed Plan Implementation Challenges for SMS4S in Murrells Inlet

2014 S.C. Water Resources Conference - Informing Strategic Water Planning to Address Natural Resource, Community and Economic Challenge

Using Water Chemistry Data to Assess Stormwater Pathways in Lowland Watersheds

2012 S.C. Water Resources Conference - Exploring Opportunities for Collaborative Water Research, Policy and Managemen

Approximating turbulent and non-turbulent events with the Tensor Train decomposition method

Low-rank multilevel approximation methods are often suited to attack high-dimensional problems successfully and they allow very compact representation of large data sets. Specifically, hierarchical tensor product decomposition methods, e.g., the Tree-Tucker format and the Tensor Train format emerge as a promising approach for application to data that are concerned with cascade-of-scales problems as, e.g., in turbulent fluid dynamics. Beyond multilinear mathematics, those tensor formats are also successfully applied in e.g., physics or chemistry, where they are used in many body problems and quantum states. Here, we focus on two particular objectives, that is, we aim at capturing self-similar structures that might be hidden in the data and we present the reconstruction capabilities of the Tensor Train decomposition method tested with 3D channel turbulence flow data

Cyberinfrastructure for Preservation of Stream and River Ecology

2008 S.C. Water Resources Conference - Addressing Water Challenges Facing the State and Regio

Adult Out of Court Disposal Pilot Evaluation - Final Report

This report combines the findings from the process and impact evaluations of the Adult Out of Court Disposal (OOCD) pilot which aimed to: assess whether (a) the pilot achieved the requirements of greater simplicity and transparency, with (b) acceptable wider implications for Criminal Justice Partners (i.e., police, HMCTS, CPS, NOMS)

The Changing Landscape for Stroke\ua0Prevention in AF: Findings From the GLORIA-AF Registry Phase 2

Background GLORIA-AF (Global Registry on Long-Term Oral Antithrombotic Treatment in Patients with Atrial Fibrillation) is a prospective, global registry program describing antithrombotic treatment patterns in patients with newly diagnosed nonvalvular atrial fibrillation at risk of stroke. Phase 2 began when dabigatran, the first non\u2013vitamin K antagonist oral anticoagulant (NOAC), became available. Objectives This study sought to describe phase 2 baseline data and compare these with the pre-NOAC era collected during phase 1. Methods During phase 2, 15,641 consenting patients were enrolled (November 2011 to December 2014); 15,092 were eligible. This pre-specified cross-sectional analysis describes eligible patients\u2019 baseline characteristics. Atrial fibrillation disease characteristics, medical outcomes, and concomitant diseases and medications were collected. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics. Results Of the total patients, 45.5% were female; median age was 71 (interquartile range: 64, 78) years. Patients were from Europe (47.1%), North America (22.5%), Asia (20.3%), Latin America (6.0%), and the Middle East/Africa (4.0%). Most had high stroke risk (CHA2DS2-VASc [Congestive heart failure, Hypertension, Age  6575 years, Diabetes mellitus, previous Stroke, Vascular disease, Age 65 to 74 years, Sex category] score  652; 86.1%); 13.9% had moderate risk (CHA2DS2-VASc = 1). Overall, 79.9% received oral anticoagulants, of whom 47.6% received NOAC and 32.3% vitamin K antagonists (VKA); 12.1% received antiplatelet agents; 7.8% received no antithrombotic treatment. For comparison, the proportion of phase 1 patients (of N = 1,063 all eligible) prescribed VKA was 32.8%, acetylsalicylic acid 41.7%, and no therapy 20.2%. In Europe in phase 2, treatment with NOAC was more common than VKA (52.3% and 37.8%, respectively); 6.0% of patients received antiplatelet treatment; and 3.8% received no antithrombotic treatment. In North America, 52.1%, 26.2%, and 14.0% of patients received NOAC, VKA, and antiplatelet drugs, respectively; 7.5% received no antithrombotic treatment. NOAC use was less common in Asia (27.7%), where 27.5% of patients received VKA, 25.0% antiplatelet drugs, and 19.8% no antithrombotic treatment. Conclusions The baseline data from GLORIA-AF phase 2 demonstrate that in newly diagnosed nonvalvular atrial fibrillation patients, NOAC have been highly adopted into practice, becoming more frequently prescribed than VKA in Europe and North America. Worldwide, however, a large proportion of patients remain undertreated, particularly in Asia and North America. (Global Registry on Long-Term Oral Antithrombotic Treatment in Patients With Atrial Fibrillation [GLORIA-AF]; NCT01468701

Effectiveness Monitoring Report, MWMF Tritium Phytoremediation Interim Measures.

This report describes and presents the results of monitoring activities during irrigation operations for the calendar year 2001 of the MWMF Interim Measures Tritium Phytoremediation Project. The purpose of this effectiveness monitoring report is to provide the information on instrument performance, analysis of CY2001 measurements, and critical relationships needed to manage irrigation operations, estimate efficiency and validate the water and tritium balance model