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Purpose: The purpose of this study was to analyse the Finnish European Surveillance of Antimicrobial Consumption (ESAC) nursing home (NH) point prevalence surveys' (PPSs) data in detail, i.e. to evaluate the variability in the prevalence of antimicrobial prescription between NHs and its relationship to resident characteristics. Methods: All residents present in NHs for ≥24 h and receiving systemic antimicrobials on the day of the survey were included. Data on antimicrobials and their indications (prophylaxis or treatment, type of infection) were collected. Results: Three PPSs were performed: eight NHs participated in April and November 2009 and nine in May-September 2010. In total, there were 5,691 eligible residents (range by survey, 1,706-2,320; range by NH, 60-688), 716 (12.6 %; range by NH, 3.2-33.3 %) of which received at least one antimicrobial and 40 residents received two. The most common indication was prophylaxis (487/5,691, 8.6 %), mainly for urinary tract infection (UTI) (460/487, 94.5 %). Of the residents, 269/5,691 (4.7 %, range by NH, 1.5-6.0 %) were on antimicrobial treatment. UTI (119/269; 44.2 %) was the most common indication for treatment. Methenamine (306/756, 40.5 %) was the most commonly used antimicrobial, followed by trimethoprim (13.6 %) and pivmecillinam (11.0 %). In the eight NHs participating in all three surveys, the prevalence of residents receiving antimicrobials decreased from 16.6 to 9.7 %. Conclusions: Antimicrobial use was common in NHs in Finland and most were used for UTI prophylaxis and treatment. The usage, however, varied among NHs and tended to decrease during the surveys. NHs may benefit from antimicrobial stewardship interventions focused on UTI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work presents a regional climate model, the Rossby Centre regional Atmospheric model (RCA1), recently developed from the High Resolution Limited Area Model (HIRLAM). The changes in the HIRLAM parametrizations, necessary for climate-length integrations, are described. A regional Baltic Sea ocean model and a modeling system for the Nordic inland lake systems have been coupled with RCA1. The coupled system has been used to downscale 10-year time slices from two different general circulation model (GCM) simulations to provide high-resolution regional interpretation of large-scale modeling. A selection of the results from the control runs, i.e. the present-day climate simulations, are presented: large-scale free atmospheric fields, the surface temperature and precipitation results and results for the on-line simulated regional ocean and lake surface climates. The regional model modifies the surface climate description compared to the GCM simulations, but it is also substantially affected by the biases in the GCM simulations. The regional model also improves the representation of the regional ocean and the inland lakes, compared to the GCM results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The total ozone reduction in the Arctic during the winters of 1993/94 and 1994/95 has been evaluated using the ground-based total ozone measurements of five SAOZ spectrometers distributed in the Arctic and from number density profiles of a balloon-borne version of the instrument. The ozone change resulting from transport has been removed using a 3D Chemistry Transport Model (CTM) run without chemistry. A cumulative total ozone depletion at the end of winter in March of 18% +/- 4% in 1994 and of 32% +/- 4% in 1995 was observed within the polar vortex, and of 15% +/- 4% in both years outside the vortex. This evaluation is not sensitive to the vertical transport in the model. The periods, locations and altitudes at which ozone loss occurred were tightly connected to temperatures lower than NAT condensation temperature.The maximum loss was observed at 50 hPa in 1994 and lower, 60-80 hPa, in 1995. Half of the depletion in 1994 and three quarters in 1995 occurred during the early winter, showing that a late final warming isnot a prerequisite for large ozone destruction in the northern hemisphere. The timing, the geographical location and the altitude of the ozone losses are well captured by the 3D CTM photochemical model using current chemistry, but its amplitude at low sun during the early winter, is underestimated. The model simulations also capture the earlyseason reductions observed outside the vortex. This suggests that the losses occurred in situ in the early winter, when low temperatures are frequent, and not later in March, when ozone is most reduced inside the vortex, which would be the case if leakage from the vortex wasthe cause of the depletion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]