Introduction: De-escalation is the key to balance judicious antibiotic usage for life-threatening infections and reducing the emergence of antibiotic resistance caused by antibiotic overuse. Robust evidence is lacking regarding the safety of antibiotic de-escalation in culture negative sepsis.Materials and Methods: Children admitted to the PICU during the first 6 months of 2019 with suspected infection were included. Based on the clinical condition, cultures and septic markers, antibiotics were de-escalated or continued at 48–72 h. Outcome data like worsening of primary infection, acquisition of hospital acquired infection, level of ICU support and mortality were captured.Results: Among the 360 admissions, 247 (68.6%) children received antibiotics. After excluding 92 children, 155 children with 162 episodes of sepsis were included in the study. Thirty four episodes were not eligible for de-escalation. Among the eligible group of 128 episodes, antibiotics were de-escalated in 95 (74.2%) and continued in 33 (25.8%). The primary infection worsened in 5 (5.2%) children in the de-escalation group and in 1 (3%) in non de-escalation group [Hazard ratio: 2.12 (95%CI: 0.39–11.46)]. There were no significant differences in rates of hospital acquired infection, mortality or length of ICU stay amongst the groups. Blood cultures and assessment of clinical recovery played a major role in de-escalation of antibiotics and the clinician's hesitation to de-escalate in critically ill culture negative children was the main reason for not de-escalating among eligible children.Conclusion: Antibiotic de-escalation appears to be a safe strategy to apply in criticallly ill children, even in those with negative cultures.
There was tremendous increase in the number of cases of mucormycosis among patients affected by coronavirus disease 2019 during the second wave of pandemic in South Asian countries. This invasive fungal infection primarily affects paranasal sinuses and can have orbito-facial and intracranial extension. We are presenting the radiological findings of invasive mucormycosis with pathological and clinical outcome correlation. It is important for radiologists to have the knowledge of various presentations of this opportunistic infection for early diagnosis and helping clinicians in planning the appropriate line of management. The study also emphasizes on the correlation between the extent of involvement with clinical outcome and we proposed a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) based scoring system to standardize and prognosticate the patients affected with mucormycosis.Materials and methods: We utilized GE 1.5 tesla, 16-channeled MRI machine for scanning the clinically suspected mucormycosis patients and did plain and contrast study of the paranasal sinuses, orbito-facial study and included brain as and when required. Images were acquired in axial, coronal, and sagittal planes using T1, T2, and fat-saturated short tau inversion recovery sequences (STIR), fat-saturated contrast sequences for better evaluation of the extent of the disease. Diffusion-weighted sequence was also acquired to detect ischemic changes in optic nerve or brain parenchyma. Contrast study was used to detect any major vessel occlusion or cavernous sinus thrombosis in the study population.Results: Total number of cases (n) included in the study were 32. The mean age group was 41-50 years with the median age was 47 years. Out of 32 cases (n=32), in 16 cases (50%) the disease was limited only to the paranasal sinuses and in remaining 16 (50%) cases, disease has spread to other regions such as orbits, facial soft tissues, optic nerve, and brain parenchyma. All the 18 cases with Mild score (MRI ROCM score 1-3) survived and all those with severe score (2 cases) (MRI ROCM score 7-10) did not survive. Conclusion:During the second wave of COVID-19 pandemic, we observed a significant rise in acute invasive mucormycosis infection primarily involving the paranasal sinuses and spread to orbito-facial, cerebral parenchyma causing related complications and hence increased morbidity and death. Radiologically, using MRI, it was effectively possible to detect early extrasinonasal spread and other fatal complications thereby guiding the physicians and surgeons in the proper early aggressive management of the disease. Here, we have described the radiological characteristics of paranasal sinus mucormycosis and its spread to other regions. We also proposed an MRI-based Scoring System for standardized assessment of the disease severity. We observed in our study that the extent of disease on MRI is directly correlating with mortality.
Since many neurological diseases are associated with altered regional cerebral flow, Arterial Spin Labelling (ASL) image being a non invasive non contrast sequence, is increasingly being used and incorporated in routine protocols as an adjuvant sequence to study the regional alterations in cerebral perfusion or Cerebral Blood Flow (CBF). It demonstrates increased or decreased regional CBF in various brain pathologies reliably without the use of intravenous contrast material. In this series, ASL is increased (increased CBF) in cases of high-grade tumour, highly cellular tumours, encephalitis, tumour recurrence, acute phase of Posterior Reversible Encephalopathy Syndrome (PRES), and decreased in cerebral infarct, peri-infarct ischaemic penumbra, thereby making an effort to emphasise the significance and utilisation of ASL in adjunct to the other routine Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) sequences.
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