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Methicillin-resistant S aureus was recirculated among the patients, the air, and the inamimate environments, especially when there was movement in the rooms. Airborne MRSA may play a role in MRSA colonization in the nasal cavity or in respiratory tract MRSA infections. Measures should be taken to prevent the spread of airborne MRSA to control nosocomial MRSA infection in hospitals.

In our controlled retrospective analysis of medical records in tertiary care academic medical center, we aimed to investigate the therapeutic effects of hyperbaric oxygen (HBO) therapy combined with steroid administration for idiopathic sudden sensorineural hearing loss (ISSNHL) in comparison with that of steroid administration alone. Our subjects were 130 consecutive inpatients with ISSNHL (hearing levels >/=40 dB; time from the onset of hearing loss to the start of treatment /=80 dB, the hearing improvement rate was significantly higher in the HBO group than in the steroid group (51.1 +/- 7.0% vs. 27.1 +/- 7.8%; P < 0.05), while in patients whose initial hearing levels were <80 dB, hearing outcomes were not statistically different between the two groups. In both the HBO and steroid groups, patients with initial hearing levels of <80 dB showed a better hearing improvement rate than those with initial hearing levels of >/=80 dB. In conclusion HBO therapy shows a significant additional effect in combination with steroid therapy for ISSNHL, particularly in patients with severe hearing loss.

The presence of PCR inhibitors in water samples is well known and contributes to the fact that a practical PCR assay has not been developed for legionella surveillance. In this study, we devised a new seminested PCR assay for detection of Legionella spp. in water samples as a means of overriding the PCR inhibitors without loss of sensitivity. The seminested PCR assay utilized primers to amplify the 16S rRNA gene (LEG primers) of 39 Legionella spp. The assay was specific to legionellae, and the sensitivity was 1 fg of extracted Legionella DNA in laboratory examination. To evaluate the feasibility and sensitivity of the PCR assay in identifying the presence of legionellae, it was used to survey Legionella contamination in the water of 49 cooling towers of 32 hospitals. A commercially available EnviroAmp Legionella kit and a culture method were also used in the survey for comparison with the seminested PCR assay. The detection rates of legionellae in the samples were 91.8% (45 of 49) by the PCR assay and 79.5% (39 of 49) by the culture method. The EnviroAmp kit revealed that 30.6% of the water samples (15 of 49) contained inhibitors of the PCR amplification. However, the seminested PCR assay could produce the Legionella-specific DNA bands in 14 of the 15 samples. Although 8 of the 14 samples were positive in the first-step PCR, 6 of the 14 samples became positive in the second-step PCR. These results suggest that the effect of PCR inhibitors in samples, if any, can be reduced because of the dilution of the sample in the second-step PCR and that sensitivity of detection can be increased by the second-step PCR. Thus, the seminested PCR assay with LEG primers to amplify the 16S rRNA gene of 39 Legionella spp. was a practical and sensitive method to detect Legionella spp. in water samples.