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Adverse drug reactions (ADRs) are a frequent cause for hospitalization and occur often in hospitalized patients.

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Drug-induced hepatitis (DIH) is an important issue in tuberculosis (TB) treatment. We intend to assess the incidence, risk factors, and outcome of hepatitis due to anti-TB drugs. The study is carried out at the national TB referral center 2006-2008 including all documented new cases of TB. All patients received standard anti-TB treatment. If DIH occurred, all drugs were discontinued and reinitiated after liver function tests (LFT) normalization in a stepwise way. Of total 761 patients, 99 (13.0%) patients developed DIH during anti-TB treatment. There was no difference in sex, nationality, smoking, or opium use history between the hepatitis group and the control group (P > 0.05). DIH was significantly higher in patients older than 65 years (P = 0.019). The mean duration of DIH from the beginning of treatment was 17.53 +/- 19.42 days (median = 12; 1-125 days). Also, the mean of the time elapsed from DIH till the (LFT) normalization was 10.26 +/- 5.95 (median = 9; 0-32 days). Anorexia, nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, jaundice, diarrhea, decreased level of consciousness, and fever were significantly higher in patients with DIH. In DIH group, 13 patients (13.4%) died, whereas in the control group, death occurred just in 21 cases (3.2%) (P < 0.001, 95% confidence interval = 2.26-9.70, odds ratio = 4.7). After adjusting with logistic regression, all the anticipated factors retained the statistical significance. Our study indicated that DIH most often occurs during the first 2 weeks of anti-TB treatment. DIH development is associated with old age, certain clinical manifestations, and higher death rates.

Our data demonstrate that repeated use of vials especially if basic sterility measures are disobeyed can cause microbial contamination of administered products to the patients. Infection preventionists are responsible to train health care workers regarding aseptic techniques and apply guidelines for aseptic handling of intravenous solutions.

antibiotics are responsible for the majority of ICU drug costs. Appropriate selection of antibiotics in terms of type, dose and duration of therapy could tremendously reduce the expenses in hospitals without negatively influencing the quality of healthcare.

The results indicate that RMP concentrations are below the reference range in most patients, while PZA is within the target range of the standard doses.

Background and Aims:Ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) is one of the most common Intensive Care Unit (ICU)-acquired infection. The aim of this study was to compare the clinical outcome of continuous and intermittent administration of piperacillin–tazobactam by serial measurements of the Clinical Pulmonary Infection Score (CPIS).Subjects and Methods:Groups were designed as parallel and the study was designed as quasi-experimental and conducted at a semi-closed ICU between September 2008 and May 2010. Patients received 3.375 g (piperacillin 3 g/tazobactam 0.375 g) either through intermittent infusion every 6 h for 30 min [Intermittent Infusion (II) group; n = 30] or through continuous infusion every 8 h for 4 h [Continuous Infusion (CI) group; n = 31]. CPIS was used to assess the clinical diagnosis and outcome of VAP patients.Results:Sex, age, Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation II II score on ICU admission, diagnosis and underlying disease of VAP patients were not significantly different in the CI (n = 31) and II (n = 30) groups. Duration of mechanical ventilation, length of stay, total number of antibiotics used per patient and duration of piperacillin/tazobactam treatment were similar in both groups. Mortality rates of VAP patients were similar between both groups during hospitalization.Conclusion:There was no significant difference in clinical outcomes of patients receiving piperacillin–tazobactam via CI or II when measured by serial CPIS score.