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Objective: To characterize the anesthetic effects of dexmedetomidine, vatinoxan and ketamine combinations in cats., Study Design: Randomized crossover experimental study., Animals: A group of seven healthy male neutered cats, with body mass 5.2 ± 0.4 kg and aged 1-2 years., Methods: Cats were implanted with a telemetric transmitter for remote recording of mean arterial pressure and heart rate before beginning the study. Each cat received a total of six treatments, coadministered in a single syringe, each at least 2 weeks apart: dexmedetomidine (25 μg kg -1 , D) + vatinoxan (600 μg kg -1 , V) + ketamine (2.5 mg kg -1 , K2.5) intramuscularly (IM) (DVK2.5IM); D + V + ketamine (5 mg kg -1 , K5) IM (DVK5IM); D + V + ketamine (10 mg kg -1 , K10) IM (DVK10IM); D + K5 IM (DK5IM); D + V + K5 subcutaneously (SC) (DVK5SC); or D + V + K5 intravenously (IV) (DVK5IV). Select physiologic variables and time to recumbency, immobilization, first movement, head lift, return to sternal recumbency and walking were recorded. Quality of sedation/anesthesia was assessed using a visual analog score. Response to noxious electrical stimulation was assessed at 10 minute intervals., Results: Heart rate (beats minute -1 ) was significantly greater in DVK5IM (overall mean ± standard deviation 142 ± 19) than in DK5IM (115 ± 16). No treatment consistently prevented movement in response to noxious stimulation. Time to first movement was significantly shorter in DVK2.5IM (45 ± 10 minutes) than in DVK10IM (93 ± 25 minutes), and in DVK5IM (53 ± 12 minutes) than in DK5IM (95 ± 39 minutes)., Conclusions and Clinical Relevance: Dexmedetomidine-vatinoxan-ketamine combinations, at the doses studied, may be useful to produce sedation, but do not appear to consistently produce anesthesia as characterized by immobility in response to noxious stimulation., (Copyright © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.)

Oxacillin resistance mediated by mecA in Staphylococcus lugdunensis is emerging in some geographic areas. We evaluated cefoxitin disk diffusion (DD) and a new oxacillin agar (supplemented with 2 μg/ml oxacillin and 2% sodium chloride) screen for the detection of mecA -mediated resistance in S. lugdunensis . A total of 300 consecutive, non-duplicated clinical S. lugdunensis isolates from diverse sources in Hong Kong in 2019 were tested. The categorical agreement and errors obtained between cefoxitin DD test, oxacillin agar screen and mecA PCR were analyzed. Isolates with discordant results were further tested by MIC, penicillin binding protein 2a (PBP2a) assays, population analysis and molecular typing. PCR showed that 62 isolates were mecA -positive and 238 isolates were mecA -negative. For cefoxitin DD results interpreted using S. aureus / S. lugdunensis breakpoints, the categorical agreement (CA) for two brands of Muller-Hinton agars, MH-II (Becton Dickinson) and MH-E (bioMérieux) were both 96.0%; MEs were both 0%; and VMEs were 19.4 and 12.9%, respectively. The new oxacillin agar reliably differentiated mecA -positive and mecA -negative isolates (100% CA) without any ME or VME results. The 8 isolates with false susceptibility in the cefoxitin DD testing had cefoxitin and oxacillin MICs in the susceptible range. The isolates showed heterogeneous oxacillin resistance with resistant subpopulations at low frequencies. All had positive PBP2a results and were typed as sequence type 27/SCC mec V. The findings highlight the inability of cefoxitin DD and MIC tests for reliable detection of some mecA -positive S. lugdunensis isolates., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2021 Ho, Law, Liu, Lau, Tong, Chow, Wu, Tse, Cheng and Que.)

The theatre sterile surgical unit (TSSU) is an essential core to support the operating theatres in National University Hospital. Surgical instruments and supplies are processed, packaged and sterilised safe for surgical procedures. A rapid improvement event adopting lean methodology was conducted with the TSSU team to streamline the workflows in this area. The project aimed to identify TSSU work processes that can be streamlined or automated, improving timeliness while identifying potential for role redesign and maximising human resource. The team successfully implemented initiatives to eliminate unnecessary workflows and achieve workload levelling. This reduced instrument processing time by 5%, while replenishment times of surgical supplies to the operating theatres decreased by 29%. The team successfully redesigned the TSSU job roles, converting several nursing staff to non-nursing roles. Long-term initiatives such as the use of disposables and an improved theatre instrument management system were planned for as well. Initiatives derived from this project can be spread to other sterile supply units within the hospital, further optimising the use of resources at a hospital level. The concept of role redesign was found to be applicable to healthcare, highlighting its potential in other areas of the hospital., Competing Interests: Competing interests: None declared., (© Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2019. Re-use permitted under CC BY-NC. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.)

Disease and cannibalism are two strongly density-dependent processes that can suppress predator populations. Here we show that California populations of the omnivorous predatory bug Geocoris pallens are subject to infection by a pathogen, as yet unidentified, that elicits elevated expression of cannibalism. Laboratory experiments showed that the pathogen is moderately virulent, causing flattened abdomens, elevated nymphal mortality, delayed development, and reduced body size of adult females. Infection furthermore increases the expression of cannibalism. Field populations of Geocoris spp. declined strongly in association with sharp increases in the expression of egg cannibalism by adult G. pallens. Increased cannibalism was accompanied by a strongly bimodal distribution of cannibalism expression, with some females (putatively uninfected) expressing little cannibalism and others (putatively infected) consuming most or all of the eggs present. Highly cannibalistic females did not increase their consumption of Ephestia cautella moth eggs, suggesting that the high cannibalism phenotype reflected a specific loss of restraint against eating conspecifics. Highly cannibalistic females also often exhibited reduced egg laying, consistent with a virulent pathogen; less frequently, more cannibalistic females exhibited elevated egg laying, suggesting that cannibalism might also facilitate recycling of nutrients in eggs. Elevated cannibalism was not correlated with reduced prey availability or elevated field densities of G. pallens. Geocoris pallens population crashes appear to reflect the combined consequences of direct virulence-adverse pathogen effects on the infected host's physiology-and indirect virulence-mortality of both infected and uninfected individuals due to elevated cannibalism expression by infected individuals.

Experimentation has been the cornerstone of much of integrated pest management (IPM) research. Here, we aim to open a discussion on the possible merits of expanding the use of observational studies, and in particular the use of data from farmers or private pest management consultants in "ecoinformatics" studies, as tools that might complement traditional, experimental research. The manifold advantages of experimentation are widely appreciated: experiments provide definitive inferences regarding causal relationships between key variables, can produce uniform and high-quality data sets, and are highly flexible in the treatments that can be evaluated. Perhaps less widely considered, however, are the possible disadvantages of experimental research. Using the yield-impact study to focus the discussion, we address some reasons why observational or ecoinformatics approaches might be attractive as complements to experimentation. A survey of the literature suggests that many contemporary yield-impact studies lack sufficient statistical power to resolve the small, but economically important, effects on crop yield that shape pest management decision-making by farmers. Ecoinformatics-based data sets can be substantially larger than experimental data sets and therefore hold out the promise of enhanced power. Ecoinformatics approaches also address problems at the spatial and temporal scales at which farming is conducted, can achieve higher levels of "external validity," and can allow researchers to efficiently screen many variables during the initial, exploratory phases of research projects. Experimental, observational, and ecoinformatics-based approaches may, if used together, provide more efficient solutions to problems in pest management than can any single approach, used in isolation.

A greater diversity of natural enemies can in some cases disrupt prey suppression, particularly when natural enemies engage in intraguild predation, where natural enemies compete with and prey upon each other. However, empirical studies have often demonstrated enhanced prey suppression despite intraguild predation. A recent theoretical study proposed the hypothesis that, when the intermediate predator is cannibalistic, intraguild predation can reduce cannibalism within the intermediate predator population, leading to little change in intermediate predator mortality and thus enhanced prey suppression. The goal of this study was to examine this hypothesis empirically. Two summer-long field enclosure experiments were conducted in cotton fields. We investigated the effects of adding an intraguild predator, Zelus renardii, on (1) the abundance of a cannibalistic intermediate predator, Geocoris pallens, (2) the abundance of a herbivore, Lygus hesperus, and (3) cotton plant performance. G. pallens adult abundance did not increase, even when food availability was high and natural enemies were absent, suggesting that density-dependent cannibalism imposes an upper limit on its densities. Furthermore, although Z. renardii is an intraguild predator of G. pallens, G. pallens long-term densities were unaffected by Z. renardii. In the presence of the intermediate predator, the addition of the intraguild predator Z. renardii enhanced suppression of L. hesperus, and there were suggestions that Z. renardii and G. pallens partitioned the L. hesperus population. Effects of herbivore suppression cascaded to the plant level, improving plant performance. In conclusion, we provide empirical support for the hypothesis that the addition of an intraguild predator may enhance prey suppression if the intermediate predator expresses density-dependent cannibalism. Intraguild predation and cannibalism co-occur in many communities; thus their joint effects may be broadly important in shaping predator effects on herbivores and plant performance.