Fungal brain abscess in a severely burned patient.

Burn patients are particularly susceptible to atypical and opportunistic infections. Here we report an unusual case of a 40-year-old previously healthy man with a 74% TBSA burn injury who developed a presumed Fusarium brain abscess. This patient had a complicated infectious course including ESBL E. coli and Elizabethkingia bacteremia and pneumonia, MRSA ventilator-associated pneumonia, Mycobacterium abscessus bacteremia, and Fusarium fungemia. After diagnosis with a fungal abscess on magnetic resonance imaging of the brain, the patient was treated with aspiration and appropriate antifungal therapies. The patient was eventually transitioned to comfort care and died on hospital day 167. This is the first published report of a Fusarium-related brain abscess since it was first reported in a case report of a burned child in 1974.

The Creation and Efforts of a Parental Task Force for Surgical Trainees.

RATIONALE AND OBJECTIONS: Surgery training often coincides with the family planning and childbearing stages of the surgeon's life. This has become especially impactful with the sharp increase in female surgical trainees. MATERIALS AND METHODS: To address important issues around family planning, our surgical department created a task force to make recommendations and create a framework as to how the department can be most supportive to surgery trainees who wish to become parents during training. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: This article describes the efforts of the task force, which include the creation of a departmental parental handbook, a family advocacy program and a novel meeting structure designed to facilitate the successful transition to and from parental leave status.