Background: Hand hygiene is considered the simplest and most cost-effective method of infection prevention. Regular observation and feedback on hand hygiene compliance are key strategies for its enhancement. This study evaluated the effectiveness of hand hygiene surveillance, including direct observation and feedback, by comprehensively analyzing the reported hand hygiene compliance within the Korean National Healthcare-Associated Infections Surveillance System from 2019 to 2022. Methods: Participating medical institutions included general hospitals and hospitals with infection control departments that consented to participate. Hand hygiene surveillance was conducted using direct observation. Collected data, including healthcare workers, clinical areas, hand hygiene moments, and hand hygiene compliance, were recorded to calculate hand hygiene compliance rates. Additionally, the volume of alcohol-based hand sanitizers used per patient per day was investigated as an indirect indicator of hand hygiene compliance. The study was conducted from July 2019 to December 2022. Results: Hand hygiene compliance increased from 87.2% in Q3 2019 to 89.9% in 2022. Nurses and medical technologists showed the highest compliance rates, whereas doctors showed the lowest compliance rates. Intensive care units excelled in compliance, whereas emergency de partments lagged. Compliance was highest after patient contact and lowest when the patient’s surroundings were touched. Larger hospitals consumed more alcohol-based hand sanitizers than smaller hospitals did. Conclusion This study confirmed an improvement in hand hygiene compliance through sustained surveillance, indicating its contribution not only to preventing infection transfer within healthcare facilities but also to fostering a culture of hand hygiene in the country.

Purpose: Targeted next-generation sequencing (NGS) panels for solid tumors have been useful in clinical framework for accurate tumor diagnosis and identifying essential molecular aberrations. However, most cancer panels have been designed to address a wide spectrum of pan-cancer models, lacking integral prognostic markers that are highly specific to gliomas. Materials and Methods: To address such challenges, we have developed a glioma-specific NGS panel, termed “GliomaSCAN,” that is capable of capturing single nucleotide variations and insertion/deletion, copy number variation, and selected promoter mutations and structural variations that cover a subset of intron regions in 232 essential glioma-associated genes. We confirmed clinical concordance rate using pairwise comparison of the identified variants from whole exome sequencing (WES), immunohistochemical analysis, and fluorescence in situ hybridization. Results: Our panel demonstrated high sensitivity in detecting potential genomic variants that were present in the standard materials. To ensure the accuracy of our targeted sequencing panel, we compared our targeted panel to WES. The comparison results demonstrated a high correlation. Furthermore, we evaluated clinical utility of our panel in 46 glioma patients to assess the detection capacity of potential actionable mutations. Thirty-two patients harbored at least one recurrent somatic mutation in clinically actionable gene. Conclusion We have established a glioma-specific cancer panel. GliomaSCAN highly excelled in capturing somatic variations in terms of both sensitivity and specificity and provided potential clinical implication in facilitating genome-based clinical trials. Our results could provide conceptual advance towards improving the response of genomically guided molecularly targeted therapy in glioma patients.

No abstract available.
Warts

The microbial community is known to have a key role during the rearing period of broilers. In this study, gut microbial composition and diversity were examined to evaluate the relationships between these factors and broiler growth performance. By applying 454-pyrosequencing of the V1–V3 regions of bacterial 16S rRNA genes, six fecal samples from four- and 28-day-old chickens from three broiler farms and 24 intestinal samples of broilers with heavy and light body weights were analyzed. Microbial composition assessment revealed Firmicutes to be the most prevalent phylum at farm A, while Proteobacteria were predominant at farms B and C. Fecal microbial richness and diversity indices gradually increased from four to 28 days at all three farms. Microbial diversity assessment revealed that small intestine microbial diversity was lower in heavy birds than in light birds. In light birds, the Firmicutes proportion was lower than that in heavy birds. In conclusion, each broiler farm revealed a specific microbial profile which varied with the age of the birds. The microbial communities appeared to affect growth performance; therefore, gut microbial profiles can be utilized to monitor growth performance at broiler farms.
Agriculture ; Birds ; Body Weight ; Chickens ; Firmicutes ; Genes, rRNA ; Intestine, Small ; Proteobacteria

No abstract available.
Ammonium Compounds* ; Epilepsy ; Poisoning* ; Status Epilepticus*

No abstract available.
Cesarean Section* ; Female ; Humans ; Lichen Planus* ; Lichens* ; Pregnancy ; Steroids

Focal acral hyperkeratosis is a rare skin disorder, initially described by Dowd et al., which is sporadic or inherited in an autosomal dominant way. Clinically, the condition presents with small yellowish to white papules located on lateral aspects of the hands and feet. Histopathological alterations are limited to the epidermis and there are no changes in the elastic fibers of the dermis. In this case report, a 14-year-old girl had a two-year history of persistent, asymptomatic, multiple papules along the border of the hands and feet. A histologic section of papules from the left hand and foot showed marked hyperkeratosis and hypergranulosis of epidermis.
Adolescent ; Dermis ; Elastic Tissue ; Epidermis ; Female ; Foot ; Hand ; Humans ; Skin

BACKGROUND: Generalized granuloma annulare (GGA) is a benign granulomatous disease of an unknown etiology. Although numerous studies about GGA have been reported, publications that describe the general clinical features of the disease are very sparse. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to identify the clinical characteristics of Korean GGA cases. METHODS: We reviewed and analyzed the clinical data derived from four patients diagnosed with GGA at our hospital and the clinical data from 58 patients diagnosed with GGA at other Korean hospitals between 1995 and 2011. RESULTS: The cutaneous lesions could be divided into the annular (n=30, 48%) and nonannular (n=32, 52%) types, and the lesions were more common in males than in females, with 33 males and 29 females affected. The GGA incidence showed a bimodal distribution with respect to age at disease onset. Twenty-six cases (42%) presented within the first decade of life and 29 cases (47%) presented when they were in the fifth decade of life or older. Twelve patients (19%) had systemic diseases. Of note, diabetes mellitus (DM) occurred only in adult GGA patients who were aged over 40 years. CONCLUSION: In contrast to previously reported studies, this study shows that the age at GGA onset has a bimodal distribution, and that GGA occurs more often in males. The prevalence of DM among GGA-affected individuals was higher than that found in the general Korean population. Therefore, a DM workup should be undertaken for GGA-affected patients who are over 40 years of age.
Adult ; Diabetes Mellitus ; Female ; Granuloma Annulare* ; Humans ; Incidence ; Korea ; Male ; Prevalence

Trichophyton tonsurans is an anthropophilic dermatophyte that is not yet truly prevalent in Korea. Especially, cases of toe nail infection during childhood are very rare, and no cases have been reported prior to this report. We report a single case of tinea unguium due to T. tonsurans in a healthy child. A 7 year-old patient visited an outpatient clinic presenting with subungual hyperkeratosis of the 1st and 3rd Rt. toe nails, which had first presented at an age of 28 months, and no other symptoms. Numerous hyphae were evident on the KOH smear examination. A confirmative diagnosis of tinea unguium cased by T. tonsurans was made after culturing scales from the toe nail lesion. The patient is currently undergoing follow-up, after being treated with oral terbinafine hydrochloride, without a relapse in symptoms.
Ambulatory Care Facilities ; Arthrodermataceae ; Child ; Follow-Up Studies ; Humans ; Hyphae ; Korea ; Nails ; Naphthalenes ; Onychomycosis ; Polyenes ; Recurrence ; Toes ; Trichophyton ; Weights and Measures

The skin lesions of herpes zoster are classically limited to a single dermatome and most cases of multidermatomal herpes zoster have contiguous skin lesions. Simultaneous involvement of two noncontiguous dermatomes is very rare and it has been referred to as zoster duplex unilateralis or bilateralis, depending whether one or both halves of the body are involved. A 67-year-old woman presented with a group of painful vesicles on the right buttock and thigh, and left anterior chest and back. The Tzanck smear and skin biopsy were consistent with a herpetic infection. We report a rare case of zoster duplex bilateralis.
Aged ; Biopsy ; Buttocks ; Female ; Herpes Zoster ; Humans ; Skin ; Thigh ; Thorax