Here are 19 articles on medical research study findings from the week of June 1.
1. When trauma patients are admitted to a dedicated trauma intensive care unit instead of a mixed ICU, they experience lower complication rates and death after complication. Read more.
2. Electronic surveillance systems equipped with natural language processing algorithms are useful for identifying simple clinical variables but not as effective as standard surveillance methods for detecting CAUTIs. Read more.
3. Research from Veterans Affairs and the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor suggests routine hospital stays can upset the balance of microbes in the human body so much that it increases the risk of sepsis in older adult patients. Read more.
4. A recent study found that days before the recent Ebola outbreak was officially announced, tweets about the virus spreading in West Africa had already reached more than 60 million people. Read more.
5. A new intervention aimed at improving hesitancy about early childhood vaccines by working directly with physicians was found to be inadequate in a recent Group Health Research Institute study. Read more.
6. Medical home interventions that feature shared savings agreements for primary care practices may improve care quality and reduce the utilization of medical services. Read more.
7. Researchers from Rochester, Minn.-based Mayo Clinic used human factors analysis, a system originally developed to investigate military plane crashes, to identify four categories of human behavior that contribute to major surgical errors. Read more.
8. A presurgical intervention that includes screening for Staphylococcus aureus and administering antibiotics based on those screening results was associated with a reduction in S. aureus surgical site infections. Read more.
9. A new study by Iowa City-based University of Iowa microbiologists suggests bacteria may contribute to causing one of the most prevalent diseases of the day: Type 2 diabetes. Read more.
10. Over-bed tables, bed rails, other flat surfaces, bed linens and patient gowns tend to be the surfaces in a hospital room that are most contaminated with methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. Read more.
11. New research conducted by researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston suggests that including a shorter readmission benchmark within that 30-day window could be more effective in signaling inpatient quality of care and unnecessary healthcare utilization. Read more.
12. Hospital size and respondents' primary language are the most significant predictors of unfavorable HCAHPS scores. Read more.
13. About one-third (35 percent) of AIDS patients diagnosed with the first opportunistic infection from 1997 to 2012 in San Francisco died within five years. Read more.
14. Physicians and nurses don't seem to agree on which risk factors are considered most important when determining whether or not to test patients for Clostridium difficile. Read more.
15. A preliminary study conducted at the University of Alabama at Birmingham found connecting cancer patients with lay navigators — trained non-clinical guides — can dramatically reduce overall costs during the course of treatment. Read more.
16. Targeting an enzyme called cGAS could be a promising pathway for developing much-needed new immunity-based therapies aimed at treating tuberculosis infection. Read more.
17. Study participants in an online diabetes prevention program maintained reductions in body weight and average blood sugar levels — two critical indicators of diabetes progression — over a two-year period. Read more.
18. The research arm of Great Neck, N.Y.-based North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System, called the Feinstein Institute for Medical Research, and Battelle, a research and development firm, created a device to help control bleeding. Read more.
19. A new study revealed resuming angiotensin receptor blockers — common medications used to treat high blood pressure — soon after surgery may decrease death rates in the first month following surgery. Read more.