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HAART toxicity caused mitochondrial damage in HIV-infected pregnant women and their newborns, being present at a genetic and functional level with a maternofoetal correlation.

, patients aged from 18 to 65 years old who attended a PCC for a new herpes zoster infection, seborrhoeic eczema, mononucleosis syndrome or leucopenia/ thrombopenia were included in the IC group, and one in every 10 randomly selected patients consulting for other reasons were included in the NIC group. A proportion of patients in each group were offered an HIV test; those who agreed to be tested were given a rapid finger-stick HIV test (€6 per test). Epidemiological and clinical data were collected and analysed. ResultsDuring the study period, 775 patients attended with one of the four selected ICs, while 66 043 patients presented with an NIC. HIV screening was offered to 89 patients with ICs (offer rate 11.5%), of whom 85 agreed to and completed testing (94.4 and 100% acceptance and completion rates, respectively). In the NIC group, an HIV test was offered to 344 persons (offer rate 5.2%), of whom 313 accepted (90.9%) and 304 completed (97.1%) testing. HIV tests were positive in four persons [prevalence 4.7%; 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.3-11.6%] in the IC group and in one person in the NIC group (prevalence 0.3%; 95% CI 0.01-1.82%; P < 0.009). If every eligible person had taken an HIV test, we would have spent €4650 in the IC group and €396 258 in the NIC group, and an estimated 36 (95% CI 25-49) and 198 persons (95% CI 171-227), respectively, would have been diagnosed with HIV infection. The estimated cost per new HIV diagnosis would have been €129 (95% CI €107-153) in the IC group and €2001 (95% CI €1913-2088) in the NIC group. ConclusionsAlthough the number of patients included in the study was small and the results should be treated with caution, IC-guided HIV testing, based on four selected ICs, in PCCs seems to be a more feasible and less expensive strategy to improve diagnosis of HIV infection in Spain than a nontargeted HIV testing strategy. With the aim of improving the detection of HIV infection in the general population, we undertook a prospective study in PCCs to compare the outcomes of two HIV testing strategies. The proportion of PCC attendees who were offered screening, the acceptance rate, the HIV prevalence and the numbers and characteristics of newly diagnosed individuals were evaluated.One of the approaches was based on screening patients attending the PCCs with four selected indicator diseases/ conditions (ICs) [herpes zoster (HZ), seborrhoeic eczema (SE), mononucleosis syndrome (MNS) and leucopenia/ thrombocytopenia (L/T)] (the IC approach) and the other approach was to test nontargeted patients attending these centres for any other reason [the non-indicator condition (NIC) approach]. MethodsFrom October 2009 to February 2011, a multicentre, prospective study was carried out, without the involvement of additional staff, in four PCCs in Barcelona, Spain, which were identified as C1, C2, C3 and C4. Centres C1, C2 and C3 serve populations of medium to high economic status with low rates of immigration, while centre C4 serves a population of low to very low socioeconomic status with a high r...

The pumpless extracorporeal lung membrane and near-static ventilation achieved a significantly better outcome than conventional treatment in this pig model of severe postpneumonectomy acute respiratory distress syndrome, probably because the injured lungs were not forced to work and this "rest" gave them more time to heal.

Mitochondrial toxicity in perinatally human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected pediatric patients has been scarcely investigated. Limited data are available about HIV or antiretroviral (ARV)-mediated mitochondrial damage in this population group, specifically, regarding oxygen consumption and apoptosis approach. We aimed to elucidate whether a given mitochondrial DNA depletion is reflected at downstream levels, to gain insight on the pathology of HIV and highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) in perinatally HIV-infected pediatric patients. We studied 10 healthy control participants and 20 perinatally HIV-infected pediatric patients (10 under ARV treatment and 10 off treatment). We determined mitochondrial mass, subunits II and IV of complex IV, global and specific mitochondrial enzymatic and oxidative activities, and apoptosis from peripheral blood mononuclear cells. Global oxygen consumption was significantly compromised in HIV-infected untreated patients, compared to the control group (0.76 ± 0.01 versus 1.59 ± 0.15; P = 0.014). Apoptosis showed a trend to increase in untreated patients as well. The overall complex (C) CI-III-IV activity of the mitochondrial respiratory chain (MRC) was significantly decreased in HIV-infected treated patients with respect to the control group (1.52 ± 0.38 versus 6.38 ± 1.53; P = 0.02). No statistically significant differences were found between untreated and HAART-treated patients. These findings suggest the pathogenic role of both HIV and HAART in mitochondrial dysfunction in vertical infection. The abnormalities in mitochondrial genome may be downstream reflected through a global alteration of the MRC. Mitochondrial impairment associated with HIV and HAART was generalized, rather than localized, in this series of perinatally HIV-infected patients.

Smart cities are a hot topic nowadays for several reasons. For city managers and citizens a smart city is a concept that should allow providing better services and/or with more efficiency. For technicians a smart city represents one of the large-scale deployments of equipment for data capturing, storage and processing. For Internet researchers a smart city can become the first massive installments of the Internet of Things concept. Smart cities are commonly implemented in several parts: the data acquisition and actuation, the aggregation networks that connect sensors/actuators with the general purpose network, the platform where data is stored and processed and the application that use the information for informing the city managers and citizens. The most costly parts of a smart city are the sensor/actuator and the aggregation network. This cost is due mainly due to the deployment and maintenance of the equipment on the city street. This paper describes the different alternatives for building the aggregation networks and provides a novel approach to facilitate the deployment of a smart city. This new solution has been tested in a real scenario achieving satisfactory results. © 2014 IEEE.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

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