Improvement of operating room air quality and sustained reduction of surgical site infections in an orthopedic specialty hospital.

INTRODUCTION: Surgical site infection (SSI) rates can be impacted by air quality, and a high-efficiency particulate air and ultraviolet air recirculation system (HUAIRS) has been shown to improve operating room air quality. This study examined the impact of HUAIRS devices on SSI rates when used at an orthopedic specialty hospital. METHODS: HUAIRS devices were used intraoperatively at the facility. Total particle counts before and after HUAIRS implementation were compared. SSI rates for nervous system procedures or for all procedures at the facility were also compared for the 2.5-year periods before and after implementing HUAIRS devices. RESULTS: Over 30,000 consecutive procedures were performed from 2017 to 2022. The overall SSI rate at the facility was 0.45% before implementing HUAIRS devices compared to 0.22% (P < 0.001) after. The SSI rate following nervous system procedures was 2.06% before implementing HUAIRS devices versus 0.29% (P < .001) after. Total particle counts were also significantly lower after implementing HUAIRS devices. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS: Implementation of HUAIRS devices at an orthopedic specialty hospital is associated with significant reductions in SSI rates and intraoperative air contamination levels. These data support the need to further investigate intraoperative air quality interventions for the reduction in SSI rates.

Array programming with NumPy.

Array programming provides a powerful, compact and expressive syntax for accessing, manipulating and operating on data in vectors, matrices and higher-dimensional arrays. NumPy is the primary array programming library for the Python language. It has an essential role in research analysis pipelines in fields as diverse as physics, chemistry, astronomy, geoscience, biology, psychology, materials science, engineering, finance and economics. For example, in astronomy, NumPy was an important part of the software stack used in the discovery of gravitational waves1 and in the first imaging of a black hole2. Here we review how a few fundamental array concepts lead to a simple and powerful programming paradigm for organizing, exploring and analysing scientific data. NumPy is the foundation upon which the scientific Python ecosystem is constructed. It is so pervasive that several projects, targeting audiences with specialized needs, have developed their own NumPy-like interfaces and array objects. Owing to its central position in the ecosystem, NumPy increasingly acts as an interoperability layer between such array computation libraries and, together with its application programming interface (API), provides a flexible framework to support the next decade of scientific and industrial analysis.

Entrainment to the CIECAM02 and CIELAB colour appearance models in the human cortex.

In human visual processing, information from the visual field passes through numerous transformations before perceptual attributes such as colour are derived. The sequence of transforms involved in constructing perceptions of colour can be approximated by colour appearance models such as the CIE (2002) colour appearance model, abbreviated as CIECAM02. In this study, we test the plausibility of CIECAM02 as a model of colour processing by looking for evidence of its cortical entrainment. The CIECAM02 model predicts that colour is split in to two opposing chromatic components, red-green and cyan-yellow (termed CIECAM02-a and CIECAM02-b respectively), and an achromatic component (termed CIECAM02-A). Entrainment of cortical activity to the outputs of these components was estimated using measurements of electro- and magnetoencephalographic (EMEG) activity, recorded while healthy subjects watched videos of dots changing colour. We find entrainment to chromatic component CIECAM02-a at approximately 35 ms latency bilaterally in occipital lobe regions, and entrainment to achromatic component CIECAM02-A at approximately 75 ms latency, also bilaterally in occipital regions. For comparison, transforms from a less physiologically plausible model (CIELAB) were also tested, with no significant entrainment found.

The difficult legacy of Turing's wager.

Describing the human brain in mathematical terms is an important ambition of neuroscience research, yet the challenges remain considerable. It was Alan Turing, writing in 1950, who first sought to demonstrate how time-consuming such an undertaking would be. Through analogy to the computer program, Turing argued that arriving at a complete mathematical description of the mind would take well over a thousand years. In this opinion piece, we argue that - despite seventy years of progress in the field - his arguments remain both prescient and persuasive.

Perioperative participation of orthopedic patients and surgical staff in a nasal decolonization intervention to reduce Staphylococcus spp surgical site infections.

With the goal of reducing rates of surgical site infections in our spine patients, we initiated a trial to investigate the impact of adding perisurgical nasal decolonization involving patients and surgical and nursing staff. We combined immediate presurgical application of a nonantibiotic alcohol-based nasal antiseptic with existing chlorhexidine bath or wipes in a comprehensive pre- and postoperative decolonization protocol. Mean infection rates were significantly decreased by 81% from 1.76 to 0.33 per 100 surgeries during the 15-month trial, when compared with the prior 9-month baseline.

Surgery for neck pain.

Axial neck pain is a common finding that typically represents a spectrum of clinical Arlington Orthopedic Associates, disorders affecting the cervical spine. Controversy exists concerning the ultimate treatment of the patient who presents with cervical spondylosis and primarily axial neck pain without radicular symptoms or myelopathy and who has failed to respond to extensive nonoperative treatment methods. Cervical discography has been used to assist in determining the specific level or levels causing the neck pain and, potentially, which levels to fuse; however, controversy regarding the specificity of cervical discograms has also been debated in the literature. Los Angeles, California We recommend exhausting all conservative means of treatment of axial neck pain. Surgery is offered only after conservative treatment fails and appropriate psychological testing is performed, as well as diagnostic imaging and discography that confirm a specific level or levels as the pain source. Cervical fusion may demonstrate good results in appropriately chosen patients with cervical spondylosis and axial neck pain.