Bilateral painful parotid lumps and a lump in the groin: An uncommon presentation of common Kikuchi's disease

Kikuchi-Fujimoto disease (KFD) is an under-recognized disease most commonly presenting with cervical lymphadenopathy, fever, and cytopenias in young females. Bilateral parotid enlargement is usually caused by infections (e.g., mumps) and autoimmune conditions (e.g., Sjogren syndrome). Parotid enlargement, inguinal lymphadenopathy, and pyrexia of unknown origin are uncommon presenting features of KFD and should be suspected in the appropriate setting

Refractory anemia in human immunodeficiency virus: Expect the unexpected

Pure red cell aplasia (PRCA) is an uncommon hematological disorder affecting selectively the erythroid cell lines. PRCA is defined as anemia with normal leukocyte and platelet counts, a corrected reticulocyte count <1%, <5% erythroid precursors in the bone marrow and an absence of hemolysis. We describe a case of Zidovudine (AZT) induced PRCA causing severe anemia in a patient taking antiretroviral therapy (ART) after 4 months of starting therapy and in whom all other causes were excluded. The hematological abnormalities resolved after AZT was replaced with tenofovir and the patient remained transfusion independent thereafter. A slowly progressive normocytic-normochromic anemia and reticulocytopenia, without leukopenia and thrombocytopenia in a patient, should raise the suspicion of PRCA. Search for underlying diseases, infections and drugs may help in the diagnosis and etiology of acquired PRCA. Elimination of potentially causative factors may induce complete recovery. AZT is a well-known cause of anemia and thus should be used with caution in the initiation of ART

International Nosocomial Infection Control Consortiu (INICC) report, data summary of 43 countries for 2007-2012. Device-associated module

We report the results of an International Nosocomial Infection Control Consortium (INICC) surveillance study from January 2007-December 2012 in 503 intensive care units (ICUs) in Latin America, Asia, Africa, and Europe. During the 6-year study using the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) U.S. National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN) definitions for device-associated health care–associated infection (DA-HAI), we collected prospective data from 605,310 patients hospitalized in the INICC's ICUs for an aggregate of 3,338,396 days. Although device utilization in the INICC's ICUs was similar to that reported from ICUs in the U.S. in the CDC's NHSN, rates of device-associated nosocomial infection were higher in the ICUs of the INICC hospitals: the pooled rate of central line–associated bloodstream infection in the INICC's ICUs, 4.9 per 1,000 central line days, is nearly 5-fold higher than the 0.9 per 1,000 central line days reported from comparable U.S. ICUs. The overall rate of ventilator-associated pneumonia was also higher (16.8 vs 1.1 per 1,000 ventilator days) as was the rate of catheter-associated urinary tract infection (5.5 vs 1.3 per 1,000 catheter days). Frequencies of resistance of Pseudomonas isolates to amikacin (42.8% vs 10%) and imipenem (42.4% vs 26.1%) and Klebsiella pneumoniae isolates to ceftazidime (71.2% vs 28.8%) and imipenem (19.6% vs 12.8%) were also higher in the INICC's ICUs compared with the ICUs of the CDC's NHSN