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Babesiosis is a tick-borne illness that can cause a wide variety of symptoms based on the severity of the disease. Mild presentations can be difficult to identify, and as a result, treatment may be delayed. A 75-year-old male presented to the Emergency Department (ED) with weakness, leg pain, and a fall. He was found to be febrile and tachycardic on arrival, and lab work revealed thrombocytopenia and acute renal dysfunction. He was admitted and found to have a Babesiosis infection, requiring treatment with red blood cell exchange and plasma exchange therapy. Tick-borne illnesses should be included in the differential even in low-risk populations and non-endemic regions due to the severity of disease complications., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright © 2024, Allen et al.)

Background: Studies have shown that women in emergency medicine (EM) lag behind their male counterparts in academic productivity., Objectives: We compared the proportion of female attending physicians from EM academic programs to the proportion of female first or second authors of original scientific manuscripts and case reports from four major EM journals in a single year., Methods: We used a retrospective cross-sectional design. Original scientific manuscripts and case reports from four major EM journals published in 2005: Academic Emergency Medicine, Annals of Emergency Medicine, American Journal of Emergency Medicine, and Journal of Emergency Medicine were reviewed to determine genders of first and second authors. The proportion of female first or second authorship was then compared to the proportion of female EM attending physicians from 134 academic EM programs in the United States. Data were analyzed using Pearson's chi-squared and Clopper-Pearson binomial confidence intervals as appropriate. A p-value of ≤ 0.05 was considered significant., Results: The percentage of female faculty; 940/3571 (26.32%, 95% confidence interval [CI] 24.9-27.8%) vs. the percentage of female first or second authorship 289/1123 (25.73%, 95% CI 23.3-28.4%) was not statistically significant (p = 0.562). There was no difference in the proportion of male and female authors with multiple manuscripts (p = 0.889)., Conclusions: As measured by first and second authorship, there was no discrepancy between the proportion of female EM faculty and the proportion of female authorship in EM literature from 2005., (Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Diseases that cause vomiting, diarrhea, constipation, and gastroenteritis are major problems for populations worldwide. Patients, particularly infants, elderly, and immunocompromised individuals, may present at any point in a wide spectrum of disease states, underscoring the need for the clinician to treat these ailments aggressively. Several promising new treatment modalities, from oral rehydration solutions to antiemetic therapies, have been introduced over the past decade. Future directions include the use of probiotic agents and better tolerated rehydration solutions. Gastrointestinal disease will continue to be a focus worldwide in the search for better ways to cure illnesses associated with vomiting and diarrhea., (Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: Gallbladder ultrasonography is a commonly performed test in the emergency department. It is unknown whether a non-fasting state alters the visualization of the gallbladder by emergency medicine (EM) residents., Objectives: We conducted this study to determine whether EM residents are able to visualize the gallbladder in volunteers who have recently consumed a fatty meal., Methods: This study used a prospective, single-blinded, randomized controlled design. Initial scans were performed on fasting volunteers. A fatty meal was then consumed. Thirty minutes after eating, a different resident, who was unaware of whether the volunteer had eaten or fasted, performed a second scan. To control for operator bias, 10% of subjects remained fasting between scans. Student's paired-samples t-test, Pearson's chi-squared, and McNemar test were determined as appropriate., Results: A total of 92 scans from 46 volunteers were analyzed. EM residents were able to visualize the gallbladder in all 40 pre-prandial scans (100%) and all 40 post-prandial scans (100%). Gallbladder area as measured in the longitudinal axis decreased 20% from a mean baseline of 11.58 +/- 4.86 cm(2) (95% confidence interval [CI] 11.17-12.98) to 9.2 +/- 5.04 cm(2) (95% CI 7.74-10.66, p = 0.0009) after food intake. Total time to scan for the fasting volunteers (110.2 s, 95% CI 84.34-136) did not change significantly from non-fasting volunteers (129.7 s, 95% CI 110.29-149.01, p = 0.153)., Conclusions: EM residents are able to visualize the gallbladder in non-fasted healthy volunteers., (Copyright 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Determination of CHE has already been proven as a useful test in the diagnosis of liver diseases. Our investigation included 2 groups of patients: a group suffering from parenchym hepatitis caused by virus infection A and B, and a second group of patients suffering from etiologically different obstructive hepatitis (malign and benign obstruction). Our tests show that there is lower CHE activity in patients with hepatitis B. There is a remarkable difference of CHE activity in benign and malign obstructive hepatitis.

We have been determining the GGT IE isoenzyme in patients with hepatitis A and B with decomposed liver cirrhosis, with obstructive hepatitis caused by the gall stones. In patients with hepatitis A and B the IE is located between albumin and betaglobulin, as well as in patients with obstructive hepatitis caused by the gall stones; in the latter partly between Alpha 1 and Alpha 2 globulin. In patients with decompensated liver cirrhosis (37.7% of the patients) there was IE activity 100% in Alpha 2 globulin area; in 6.25% of patients the activity was in the prealbumin area. In patients with secondary liver tumors we got a rather high increase of the GGT IE activity in Alpha 1 globulin area, in 77.7% of the patients even 80 to 100%. In some patients with disease progression we noticed the GGT IE activity in Beta globulin area. The results in primary liver malignomas were different. In 68.5% of the patients the GGT IE activity dominated in Alpha 1 globulin area.