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New antibiotic kills off persistent infections

phenomena.nationalgeographic.com

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Re: New antibiotic kills off persistent infections

#81
post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

killing bacteria alone isnt a problem. Killing bacteria while keeping a human alive starts to complicate the problem. Killing certain bacteria while keeping a human and the rest of said humans helpful bacteria alive but not resistant to anti-bodies, is a whole different ballgame...

> killing bacteria alone isnt a problem. Killing bacteria while keeping a human alive starts to complicate the problem. Thank you Captain Obvious.

You'd think this was "Captain Obvious", but this is genuinely a challenge for some bacterial infections. Its even worse for fungal infections, as fungi are eukaryotic and thus share a alarming number of potential drug targets with human cells.

Re: New antibiotic kills off persistent infections

#82
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your "Good summary" is in a journal that's pretty far from what I'd call reputable. The PLOS One article on Rhesus monkeys isn't terribly definitive either - it's a big step between persisting in a host and capable of producing disease without manifesting any laboratory detectable presence. To jump from "This might be a cause" to "Lets treat people with long term courses of antibiotics, which have known and often sev…

Would you agree that a medical journal's impact factor is more important for new research than a summary? I would think that for a summary the quantity and quality of the references is a bigger factor. As far as the clinicians, having a lot of family experience with the disease, I've seen things far differently. This in addition to support groups, phone calls, etc. We're not going to get anywhere debating experience,…

Honestly no - for a review article, I generally prefer journals with a better reputation. Not necessarily based on Impact Factor, but I'd much rather rely on a non-systematic review from JAMA, Lancet ID, JID, JAMA or PLOS Medicine. Or any one of a number of specialty or society level journals.

I'd rather not rely on an article from an OA factory that's spammy enough for people to wonder if its a scam journal. For a systematic review or meta-analysis I might let it slide, but this was an opinion-y "Review of the Evidence". The somewhat wide ranging stuff the author writes on makes me a little skittish as well.

I'm sorry to hear of your family's experience. I occasionally have my own issues with clinicians.

Re: New antibiotic kills off persistent infections

#83
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are simpler things. Like not having mega-hospitals that are impossible to keep entirely clean. Growing up near the UCLA Medical Center, a vast, vast complex, I heard tales that there were diseases that existed there and nowhere else in the world. Most patients derive little benefit from the scale of the hospital and the fact that in a huge hospital getting all rooms clean at once is logistically very difficult…

I'm...not sure I agree with most of this. First of all, the size and scope of the hospital has very little to do with whether or not any particular room can be cleaned. The things that are "hard" to clean in rooms are features of the rooms themselves, not the number of them. For example, even small hospitals have TV remotes, soft and absorbent surfaces like mattresses, toilets, etc. For that matter, small hospitals c…

First of all, the size and scope of the hospital has very little to do with whether or not any particular room can be cleaned.

Uh, you're right but you're missing the implication. Scale influences whether every room can be clean simultaneously. A given room being dirty and infected with a bug adapted to surviving in a hospital lets said bug be tracked or blown to a different room before the bug is eliminated from the first room.

As for dedicated teams, I don't see why such things couldn't exist on a city-wide basis if they were useful.

The question whether healthcare benefits economies of scale at all is open to question. It clearly doesn't benefit too much given the lack of price differentials. The lousy and getting-lousier quality of American healthcare just generally indicates that hospitals don't put profits from economies of scale or whatever else back to real improvements in safety - though they apparent put a lot of money into meals to entice returning patients (fancy meals - visible, real safety - invisible).

Re: New antibiotic kills off persistent infections

#84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are simpler things. Like not having mega-hospitals that are impossible to keep entirely clean. Growing up near the UCLA Medical Center, a vast, vast complex, I heard tales that there were diseases that existed there and nowhere else in the world. Most patients derive little benefit from the scale of the hospital and the fact that in a huge hospital getting all rooms clean at once is logistically very difficult…

I'm honestly surprised we don't take a quarantine approach in hospitals. i.e The first sign of an infection gets you shipped out to a specialized hospital building (air gap) designed specifically to be able to keep patients in "solitary confinement" and able to be completely disinfected afterwards.

Most infectious diseases are not so dangerous that this is necessary. The ones that are, they do something like that as the other poster mentioned.

The fact of the matter though, is that a hospital for those with whatever condition is a somewhat ideal breeding ground for germs, not all of which will be deadly of course. That's not something is likely to be completely eliminated but it's something we can mitigate in a variety of ways.

Re: New antibiotic kills off persistent infections

#85
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm...not sure I agree with most of this. First of all, the size and scope of the hospital has very little to do with whether or not any particular room can be cleaned. The things that are "hard" to clean in rooms are features of the rooms themselves, not the number of them. For example, even small hospitals have TV remotes, soft and absorbent surfaces like mattresses, toilets, etc. For that matter, small hospitals c…

First of all, the size and scope of the hospital has very little to do with whether or not any particular room can be cleaned. Uh, you're right but you're missing the implication. Scale influences whether every room can be clean simultaneously . A given room being dirty and infected with a bug adapted to surviving in a hospital lets said bug be tracked or blown to a different room before the bug is eliminated from th…

I'm not missing the implication, because rooms don't have to be clean simultaneously. Bacteria aren't actually all that mobile - most transmission is from touch contact with surfaces (or patients, who are themselves surfaces). Major disinfection takes place when a room is vacated, and it gets done - there's no reason to suggest that a cleaning staff doesn't scale with hospital size.

What's far more important is the quality of the room disinfection, which again, is a property of the room, not the number of them.

As for dedicated teams, I don't see why such things couldn't exist on a city-wide basis if they were useful.

Because now all you've done is taken the same workload, and said "Now you need to deal with 5 different smaller hospitals, five administration schemes (two of which don't like you), travel time, etc. Smaller hospitals do do this, sharing their burden between them, but a dedicated team has been shown to perform better.

And for specialized high risk disinfection teams, you've now suggested both that rooms need to be cleaned simultaneously, and that having a team across town is A-OK. Pick one, you really can't have both.

The lousy and getting-lousier quality of American healthcare just generally indicates that hospitals don't put profits from economies of scale or whatever else back to real improvements in safety - though they apparent put a lot of money into meals to entice returning patients (fancy meals - visible, real safety - invisible).

This really isn't true at all. Because hospitals aren't reimbursed for hospital-acquired infections, it costs them real money, and there is intense interest in improving patient safety. MRSA rates have been dropping, antibiotic stewardship programs are better, hand-washing rates are much improved, etc.

Fancy meals might be visible, but a bad case of C. difficile will cost a hospital many, many thousands of dollars. They're interested in preventing those types of infections.

I know because I work with them doing exactly that.

Re: New antibiotic kills off persistent infections

#86
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, just an ear infection. More annoying than anything. Although it does supposedly carry some risk of hearing loss should it come back hard.

You are most likely eating something you are intolerant to. You need to do an elimination diet, SCD diet, and eliminate all grains temporarily. Curing this with antibiotics would only be a temporary solution, and antibiotics in general are not a good strategy for dealing with long term infections.

Thanks for the feedback. As relates to sinuses, is the theory that the infection is a product of food-induced inflammatory conditions that don't allow for proper drainage?

Because, some of my experience would suggest that it may be exacerbated by inflammation somewhat, but the primary cause is a persistent reservoir of bacteria. This could be a biofilm or otherwise dormant bacteria as described in the article. Actually, the latter is much more plausible as and, in all the time I have been dealing with this, no physician has ever mentioned that bacteria even have such a dormant state.

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