1,721,008 research outputs found
Antibacterial Utilization for Febrile Illnesses and Laboratory-confirmed Bloodstream Infections in Northern Tanzania
No full textAntibacterial management of febrile patients in low-resource settings is challenging and adherence to treatment guidelines is variable. We describe antibacterial use in febrile patients, use of effective therapy for laboratory-confirmed bloodstream infections, and adherence to published guidelines for common febrile illnesses among patients enrolled in prospective hospital-based fever surveillance studies in Moshi, Tanzania.We compared data from two hospital-based prospective cohort studies, Cohort 1 (2011–2014) and Cohort 2 (2016–2019), that enrolled febrile infants, children, and adults. A study team member administered a standardized questionnaire, performed a physical examination, and collected blood cultures on all participants. Ceftriaxone, ciprofloxacin, amoxicillin-clavulanate, or azithromycin were categorized as broad-spectrum antibacterials based on published frameworks and local antimicrobial availability. Participants with laboratory-confirmed bloodstream infections were categorized as receiving effective or ineffective antibacterials based on culture and susceptibility data. Antimicrobials prescribed for preliminary or final diagnosis of pneumonia, urinary tract infection, or presumed sepsis were compared with syndrome-specific recommendations from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Tanzania Standard Treatment Guidelines. We used descriptive statistics and logistic regression to describe factors associated with antibacterial use.We analyzed data from 2175 participants. The median age of participants in Cohort 1 was 29 (IQR: 5-41) and 22 in Cohort 2 (IQR: 2-45). Among all participants, 50% were female. There were 430 (42.0%) and 501 (45.1%) participants who reported use of antibacterials prior to admission in Cohort 1 and Cohort 2, respectively. There were 989 (91.4%) participants who received antibacterials during admission for febrile illness in Cohort 1 versus 1060 (93.6%) in Cohort 2 (p Receipt of antibacterials prior to and after hospital admission were high and use of broad-spectrum medications was common. A large proportion of participants with culture-confirmed bloodstream infections were treated with ineffective antibacterials but consistency of antibacterial prescribing with WHO and Tanzanian treatment guidelines improved over time. Our results highlight the need for improved diagnostics for febrile illness, data on local antimicrobial resistance patterns, institution-specific clinical guidelines, and provider education to improve prescribing practices and rational use of antimicrobials in Tanzania.</p
Sepsis in sub-Saharan Africa: a prospective observational study of clinical characteristics, management, and outcomes for adolescents and adults with sepsis in northern Tanzania
No full textBackground: Sepsis is a leading cause of death and disability globally. Despite a high burden of sepsis in sub-Saharan Africa, clinical data for sepsis in that setting are limited. We sought to describe the clinical characteristics, management, and outcomes in a cohort of adults and adolescents with sepsis in northern Tanzania. We also assessed for associations between clinical factors and in-hospital mortality.Methods: We carried out a prospective observational cohort study at Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Centre in Moshi, Tanzania. We collected data on demographics, baseline clinical characteristics, and management, with an emphasis on hours 0-6 after arrival to the Emergency Department. Log risk regression was carried out to assess for associations between demographic and clinical factors and our primary outcome of in-hospital death. Separate multivariable regression analyses were conducted for both antimicrobial administration by hour 6 and administration of intravenous (IV) fluids >1L by hour 6 and the outcome of in-hospital mortality.Results: Fifty-eight participants were included in our analysis. Seventeen (29.3%) participants died in-hospital. Baseline characteristics associated with inpatient mortality included inability to drink unassisted, respiratory rate >30 breaths per minute, hypoxia, and altered mentation. Less than half of participants received any antimicrobial by hour 6, and most participants received 1L by hour 6 was associated with inpatient mortality.Conclusion: Sepsis in northern Tanzania carries a high risk of in-hospital mortality. Further research is urgently needed to establish the highest-yield interventions suited to the unique characteristics of sepsis in sSA.</p
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
koamabayili/VECTRON-author-checklist: VECTRON author checklist
No full textWe have done our best to complete the author checklist relating to the use of animals in the hut study. Note that the objective for the hut study was to evaluate the IRS treatment applications for residual efficacy against Anopheles mosquitoes, including the local An. coluzzii mosquito population. Cows were only used to attract mosquitoes into the huts and no tests were carried out directly on the cows. The author checklist is intended for use with studies where experiments are carried out on animals, which is why we have had such difficulty in completing this for the hut study, as many of the questions do not relate to how the cows were used
Author-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.
No full textAuthor-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.</p
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