Acinetobacter species as pathogens in tertiary care hospital - A retrospective study

Acinetobacter species are gaining importance in the present days. Here we report isolation of 149 isolates of Acinetobacter species from various clinical samples from the intensive units of our hospital. We used standard microbiological techniques to identify the isolates and antibiotic sensitivity testing was done by using Kirby-Bauer disc diffusion technique. A.baumanii was the commonest organism in our study and was found multi drug resistant.ÂÂ

Neurobrucellosis presenting as an intra-medullary spinal cord abscess

BACKGROUND: Of the diverse presentation of neurobrucellosis, intra-medullary spinal cord abscess is extremely rare. Only four other cases have been reported so far. We present a case of spinal cord intra-medullary abscess due to Brucella melitensis. CASE PRESENTATION: A forty-year-old female presented with progressive weakness of both lower limb with urinary incontinence of 6 months duration. She was febrile. Neurological examination revealed flaccid areflexic paraplegia with T(10 )below sensory impairment including perianal region. An intramedullary mass was diagnosed on Magnetic Resonance Image (MRI) scan extending from T(12 )to L(2). At surgery, a large abscess was encountered at the conus medullaris, from which Brucella melitensis was grown on culture. She was started on streptomycin and doxycycline for 1 month, followed by rifampicin and doxycycline for 1 month. At 2-year follow-up, she had recovered only partially and continued to have impaired bladder function. CONCLUSION: Neurobrucellosis, if not treated early, can result in severe neurological morbidity and sequale, which may be irreversible. Hence it is important to consider the possibility of neurobrucellosis in endemic region and treat aggressively

SAFETY ASSESSMENT OF L-DOPA AND HYOSCINE HYDROBROMIDE IN COMBINATION: ACUTE AND SUB-ACUTE ORAL TOXICITY STUDIES

Objective: To evaluate the safety of L-Dopa and hyoscine hydrobromide combination by determining its potential toxicity after acute and sub-acute oral administration in rats.Methods: The acute and sub-acute toxicity study was performed according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Guideline 423 and 407 respectively. The combination of L-dopa and hyoscine hydrobromide was administered at 5 times the upper limit of therapeutic dose of each drug which is 1200 mg/d for L-dopa and 0.75 mg/d for hyoscine hydrobromide for adult human being and which was converted to required dose for Wistar rats (3 males and 3 females).Results: The combination of L-dopa and hyoscine hydrobromide at 5 times the upper therapeutic dose produced no treatment-related signs of toxicity or mortality in any of the animals tested during 14 d of the study. In the repeated dose 28 d oral toxicity study, there was no significant difference in any of the assigned parameters between the control and all treatment groups.Conclusion: It is established that the combination therapy of L-dopa and hyoscine hydrobromide is safe at 5 times the upper limit of therapeutics dose of each drug.Â

Arzanol, a Potent mPGES-1 Inhibitor: Novel Anti-Inflammatory Agent

Arzanol is a novel phloroglucinol α-pyrone, isolated from a Mediterranean plant Helichrysum italicum (Roth) Don ssp. microphyllum which belongs to the family Asteraceae. Arzanol has been reported to possess a variety of pharmacological activities. However, anti-inflammatory, anti-HIV, and antioxidant activities have been studied in some detail. Arzanol has been reported to inhibit inflammatory transcription factor NFκB activation, HIV replication in T cells, releases of IL-1β, IL-6, IL-8, and TNF-α, and biosynthesis of PGE2 by potentially inhibiting mPGES-1 enzyme. Diversity of mechanisms of actions of arzanol may be useful in treatment of disease involving these inflammatory mediators such as autoimmune diseases and cancer. This review presents comprehensive information on the chemistry, structure-activity relationship, and pharmacological activities of arzanol. In addition this review discusses recent developments and the scope for future research in these aspects

iAggregator: Multidimensional Relevance Aggregation Based on a Fuzzy Operator

International audienceRecently, an increasing number of information retrieval studies have triggered a resurgence of interest in redefining the algorithmic estimation of relevance, which implies a shift from topical to multidimensional relevance assessment. A key underlying aspect that emerged when addressing this concept is the aggregation of the relevance assessments related to each of the considered dimensions. The most commonly adopted forms of aggregation are based on classical weighted means and linear combination schemes to address this issue. Although some initiatives were recently proposed, none was concerned with considering the inherent dependencies and interactions existing among the relevance criteria, as is the case in many real-life applications. In this article, we present a new fuzzy-based operator, called iAggregator, for multidimensional relevance aggregation. Its main originality, beyond its ability to model interactions between different relevance criteria, lies in its generalization of many classical aggregation functions. To validate our proposal, we apply our operator within a tweet search task. Experiments using a standard benchmark, namely, Text REtrieval Conference Microblog,1 emphasize the relevance of our contribution when compared with traditional aggregation schemes. In addition, it outperforms state-of-the-art aggregation operators such as the Scoring and the And prioritized operators as well as some representative learning-to-rank algorithms

Detection of extra-cellular enzymes of anaerobic gram-negative bacteria from clinically diseased and healthy sites

Anaerobic gram-negative bacteria (AGNB) produce enzymes that play a significant role in the development of disease. We tested 50 AGNB isolates, 25 each from clinically diseased and healthy human sites for in vitro production of caseinase, collagenase, etc. Majority of the isolates were Bacteroides fragilis and Porphyromonas gingivalis , which more commonly produced collagenase and haemolysin. Comparatively larger number of clinical AGNB produced collagenase (P = 0.004). No such difference was observed with other enzymes. Hence, collagenase is probably one of the key virulence markers of pathogenic AGNB, and the inhibitors targeting collagenases might help in the therapy of anaerobic infections

Nocardia asteriods spinal osteomyelitis in an immunocompromised host from South India

Abstract The clinical presentation of nocardiosis is protean. Very few cases of spinal nocardiosis have been reported in the past. A 50 year old man, who was HIV seropositive presented with low grade fever and lower limb weakness. MRI study showed an extradural compression between T3 -T5 level with huge paraspinal soft tissue collection. The patient developed acute paraplegia on admission, and was treated with emergency surgical decompression. The pus sample collected during surgery yielded Nocardia asteroides. The patient was treated with combination of doxycycline and co-trimoxazole. Postoperatively, fever and chest symptoms resolved. However, there was no significant improvement in the neurological symptoms at the time of discharge from the hospital. High index of suspicion is therefore necessary to diagnose nocardial infections due to its varied presentations especially in an immunocompromised host. Early diagnosis and treatment can improve the outcome

Comparative evaluation of the effect of commercially available two different forms of denture cleansers on denture biofilm in diabetic and nondiabetic individuals: An in vivo study

Statement of Problem: Denture cleansers are known to decrease the microbial counts in denture wearers. In certain medical conditions such as in diabetes, achieving reduction in microbial count and maintaining proper denture hygiene is difficult. Denture cleansers are used as an aid in maintaining denture hygiene in such patients. A number of tablets, pastes, and powders are available for cleaning dentures. Although the comparison of chemical methods and brushing is relatively common, their difference in diabetic denture biofilm and nondiabetic denture biofilm has not been previously described. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of commercially available two different forms of denture cleansers on the denture biofilm in diabetic and nondiabetic denture-wearing individuals. Methodology: Twenty diabetic denture and 20 nondiabetic denture wearers were randomly selected for the study. Denture biofilm was collected twice for each participant, before and after use of denture cleanser for 21-day period. For sample collection, complete dentures were rinsed with distilled water and brushed. Inoculation was done with sterile loop and cultured on blood agar and chrome agar. Blood agar plates were incubated at 370°C for 24 h and chrome agar at 290°C for 24 h. Colonies' characteristics of the Streptococcus species and Candida species were counted after the incubation period. Results: The results showed a statistically significant reduction in the colony-forming unit (CFU) counts after the usage of denture cleansers. Furthermore, the Candidal count difference obtained by the use of effervescent tablets was more than paste form. Conclusions: The present study concluded that microbial colonization count of diabetic and nondiabetic denture biofilm significantly reduced after 21 days of usage of denture cleansers, and the effervescent tablets were more effective against Candida than paste form