A digital controller using multirate sampling for gain control

Digital controller using multirate sampling for gain contro

Risk factors for indigenous Campylobacter jejuni and Campylobacter coli infections in The Netherlands: a case-control study

A case-control study comprising 1315 Campylobacter jejuni cases, 121 Campylobacter coli cases and 3409 frequency-matched controls was conducted in The Netherlands in 2002-2003. Risk factors for both C. jejuni and C. coli enteritis were consumption of undercooked meat and barbecued meat, ownership of cats and use of proton pump inhibitors. Consumption of chicken was a predominant risk factor for C. jejuni enteritis, but many additional risk factors were identified. Unique risk factors for C. coli infections were consumption of game and tripe, and swimming. Contact with farm animals and persons with gastroenteritis were predominant risk factors for C. jejuni enteritis in young children (0-4 years). Important risk factors for the elderly (>= 60 years) were eating in a restaurant, use of proton pump inhibitors and having a chronic intestinal illness. Consumption of chicken in spring, steak tartare in autumn and winter and barbecued meat in rural areas showed strong associations with C. jejuni infections. This study illustrates that important differences in risk factors exist for different Campylobacter spp. and these may differ dependent on age, season or degree of urbanization

Inaccuracy of routine susceptibility tests for detection of erythromycin resistance of Campylobacter jejuni and Campylobacter coli

In The Netherlands, both an increase in and regional differences in erythromycin resistance of Campylobacter jejuni and Campylobacter coli have been reported. To determine the accuracy of routine tests for erythromycin resistance, 48 erythromycin-resistant isolates from various laboratories that participate in the Dutch surveillance of Campylobacter infections were reinvestigated. Initial susceptibility testing for erythromycin had been performed by disk diffusion in six and MIC-based methods in two laboratories. Reinvestigation was carried out using broth microdilution as a reference standard, as well as E-test and genetic resistance testing. Of 36 C. jejuni isolates reported by the initial laboratories as erythromycin-resistant, four (11%) and five (14%) were confirmed as erythromycin-resistant using broth microdilution according to CLSI and EUCAST resistance criteria, respectively. Erythromycin resistance was found in eight of 12 (67%) C. coli isolates according to both criteria. Results of E-tests were in accordance with these results in all isolates. Resistance-associated mutations in the 23S rRNA gene (A2059G and A2058T) were found in all isolates showing high-level resistance, whereas none were found in susceptible isolates. Routine determination of the erythromycin resistance of C. jejuni and C. coli shows unacceptable interlaboratory variation. In the absence of standardized protocols and interpretive criteria for disk diffusion, and while we await the development of easily applicable and reliable methods for molecular resistance testing, the use of broth microdilution remains the best method

“I Wish I Had AIDS”: A qualitative study on access to health care services for HIV/AIDS and diabetic patients in Cambodia

Financially stricken Cambodian patients with diabetes and HIV/AIDS typically encounter multiple, serious barriers to effective care. This process may extend over many years and involve numerous rounds of diagnosis and treatment as the disease progresses from initial symptoms to longer term complications. Living with both the impact of the disease and this ongoing struggle for care can severely disrupt the everyday life of both sufferers and their families. Our retrospective study adopted qualitative research methods to collect data from HIV/AIDS and diabetic patients enrolled and not enrolled in treatment programs at varying institutions in urban and rural settings. Using purposive sampling techniques, a total of 25 HIV/AIDS and 45 diabetic patients were recruited. Semi-structured and open-ended interviews were used to collect information on patient experiences of different phases in the on-going process of seeking care and treatment. The findings indicate that both HIV/AIDS and diabetic patients encounter multiple supply- and demand-side barriers to care at different stages of their illness. More strikingly, our research findings suggest that supply-side barriers, for example rationing systems or targeting strategies that limit access to free treatment or social assistance, are substantially higher for diabetic patients. This perceived inequity had a profound impact on diabetic patients to the extent that some “wished they had HIV/AIDS”. These findings suggest that there is an urgent need to widen the focus of health care to address the substantial and increasing burden of disease resulting from diabetes and other serious chronic disorders in Cambodia and many other low/middle income countries.

Trends in Gastro-enteritis in Nederland. Notitie met betrekking tot 2007

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Библиотековедение как фундаментальная наука

The Netherlands saw an unexplained increase in campylobacteriosis incidence between 2003 and 2011, following a period of continuous decrease. We conducted an ecological study and found a statistical association between campylobacteriosis incidence and the annual number of prescriptions for proton pump inhibitors (PPIs), controlling for the patient's age, fresh and frozen chicken purchases (with or without correction for campylobacter prevalence in fresh poultry meat). The effect of PPIs was larger in the young than in the elderly. However, the counterfactual population-attributable fraction for PPIs was largest for the elderly (ca 45% in 2011) and increased at population level from 8% in 2004 to 27% in 2011. Using the regression model and updated covariate values, we predicted a trend break for 2012, largely due to a decreased number of PPI prescriptions, that was subsequently confirmed by surveillance data. Although causality was not shown, the biological mechanism, age effect and trend-break prediction suggest a substantial impact of PPI use on campylobacteriosis incidence in the Netherlands. We chose the ecological study design to pilot whether it is worthwhile to further pursue the effect of PPI on campylobacteriosis and other gastrointestinal pathogens in prospective cohort studies. We now provide strong arguments to do so

Evaluation of Syndromic Surveillance in the Netherlands: Its Added Value and Recommendations for Implementation

In the last decade, syndromic surveillance has increasingly been used worldwide for detecting increases or outbreaks of infectious diseases that might be missed by surveillance based on laboratory diagnoses and notifications by clinicians alone. There is, however, an ongoing debate about the feasibility of syndromic surveillance and its potential added value. Here we present our perspective on syndromic surveillance, based on the results of a retrospective analysis of syndromic data from six Dutch healthcare registries, covering 1999–2009 or part of this period. These registries had been designed for other purposes, but were evaluated for their potential use in signalling infectious disease dynamics and outbreaks. Our results show that syndromic surveillance clearly has added value in revealing the blind spots of traditional surveillance, in particular by detecting unusual, local outbreaks independently of diagnoses of specific pathogens, and by monitoring disease burden and virulence shifts of common pathogens. Therefore we recommend the use of syndromic surveillance for these applications

Evaluating score distributions in the revised Dutch version of the Childhood Health Assessment Questionnaire

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Licens

Nationwide outbreak of STEC O157 infection in the Netherlands, December 2008-January 2009: continuous risk of consuming raw beef products.

The Netherlands experienced a nationwide outbreak of Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) O157 with onset of symptoms from the end of December 2008 until the end of January 2009. A total of 20 laboratory-confirmed cases were linked to the outbreak strain, serotype O157: H-, stx1, stx2, eae and e-hly positive. The investigation into the source of this outbreak is still ongoing, but evidence so far suggests that infection occurred as a result of consuming contaminated raw meat (steak tartare)