
Effect of Copper on the Healing of Obstetric Wounds
Cesarean Section; InfectionPerineal Infection2 moreThe most common complication of vaginal delivery is perineal tearing with a prevalence of 85% and 70% will need suturing. The caesarean section rate worldwide is rising and the rate in Croydon University Hospital is in the region of 25% of all deliveries. One in ten women will develop a wound infection of their perineal tear or caesarean section wound. Wound infection can cause pain, dehiscence, delayed wound healing, prolonged hospital stay, readmissions and interfere with a woman's ability to nurture their baby and enjoy motherhood. Copper has shown to have strong antimicrobial properties, with the ability to kill various bacteria including MRSA. It has also been shown that copper promotes new blood vessel formation and therefore enhance wound healing. This study is to investigate the effect of copper impregnated dressings and maternity pads on wound infection. Women will be randomised for a wound dressing or maternity pad with (study group) or without copper (control group). Both the clinician and the woman will be blinded to the randomised group. Wound infection will be assessed via a telephone questionnaire after 7, 14 and 30 days after delivery. When wound infection is suspected, based on the questionnaire, a swab of the wound site will be taken to detect the causative bacteria.

High Strength Cranberry Supplementation for Prevention of Recurrent Urinary Tract Infection
Urinary Tract InfectionThis clinical trial is a Phase 2, multicenter, placebo-controlled, double-blind, parallel-arm study to evaluate the efficacy and safety of High Strength Cranberry (500mg Pacran®) in preventing UTI (cystitis) in women with a history of recurrent UTI (rUTI).

Early Recognition and Response to Increases in Surgical Site Infections Using Optimized Statistical...
Infection ControlSurgical Site InfectionThe purpose of this quality improvement study is to measure the effectiveness of surveillance using optimized statistical process control (SPC) methods and feedback on rates of surgical site infection (SSI) compared to traditional surveillance and feedback. The primary objective is to determine if hospital clusters randomized to receive feedback from optimized SPC surveillance methods collectively have lower rates of SSI compared to hospital clusters randomized to receiving feedback from traditional surveillance methods. Secondary objectives are 1) to estimate and compare the number of signals identified using optimized SPC methods and traditional surveillance methods; 2) to estimate and compare the time and effort required to investigate signals generated using optimized SPC methods and traditional surveillance methods; and 3) to estimate the number and proportion of false-positive signals identified using optimized SPC methods and traditional surveillance methods. The Early 2RIS study will be a prospective, multicenter cluster randomized controlled trial using stepped wedge design. The active component of the quality improvement study will be performed in 29 DICON hospitals over three years, from March 2017 through February 2020. Clusters randomized to intervention will receive feedback on increasing rates of SSI identified through optimized SPC methods. This intervention is expected to decrease the subsequent rate of SSIs by closing the feedback loop on SSI outcomes. Participating study hospitals will all be members of DICON, a network of 43 community hospitals in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, and Virginia that provides community hospitals access to consultative services from infection prevention experts, data analyses and benchmarking, and educational materials designed by faculty from Duke. This study is considered part of routine quality improvement measures and a part of previously established agreements between DICON and the community hospitals. Data flow and communication are outlined in detail in approved protocols determined to be exempt research by the DUHS IRB. Briefly, existing clinical data are extracted from participating hospitals' electronic medical record into discrete files according to DICON specifications. Then a de-identification process removes direct patient identifiers into a limited dataset. The majority of data collection will occur through methods already developed and utilized by study hospitals. In brief, each hospital routinely submits limited datasets to the DICON Surgical Surveillance Database, including the following variables: hospital, type of procedure, patient identifier, date of procedure, age, sex, surgeon identifier, start/stop times, ASA score, wound class, risk index, SSI (Yes/No), date of infection, type of SSI, location at diagnosis and organism. No identifiable patient or surgeon data are transmitted to the DICON Surgical Database. Data definitions and data collection methods are standardized across DICON hospitals. Following signal adjudication, additional data will be collected in a REDCap database to document actions and rationale.

Efficacy, Safety, and Tolerability Study of Oral Full-Spectrum MicrobiotaTM (CP101) in Subjects...
Clostridium Difficile Infection RecurrenceSubjects with recurrent C. difficile infection will receive an oral dose of CP101 capsules one time in Treatment Group I or matching placebo one time in Treatment Group II. The purpose of this study is to demonstrate the safety and effectiveness of CP101 to prevent recurrence of C. difficile. Subjects with confirmed C. difficile recurrence within 8 weeks after administration of study drug (CP101 or placebo) may be eligible to enroll in the open-label extension study (CP101-CDI-E02) and will receive CP101.

Reducing Urinary Tract Infection Rates Using a Controlled Aseptic Protocol for Catheter Insertion...
Urinary Tract InfectionsCatheter Infection1 moreUrinary Tract Infection (UTI) complications following catheter use in surgical patients remains high. Using an aseptic protocol has been shown to drastically reduce UTI incidence by 50%. Reducing UTIs will prevent extended hospital stays, readmission, and antibiotic use associated with this complication and improve cost-effectiveness of care. The investigators hypothesize that they can reduce the incidence of UTIs after catheter placement with the implementation of a Quality Improvement (QI) protocol to prevent excess exposure to the environment exposure of the catheter before, during and after insertion.

Bezlotoxumab (MK-6072) Versus Placebo in Children With Clostridium Difficile Infection (CDI) (MK-6072-001)...
Clostridium Difficile InfectionThe primary objectives of this study are to evaluate the pharmacokinetics (PK), safety, and tolerability of bezlotoxumab (MK-6072) in children aged 1 to <18 years of age with a confirmed diagnosis of Clostridium difficile infection (CDI) who are receiving antibacterial drug treatment. The primary hypothesis is that the area under the concentration-time curve from 0 to infinity (AUC0-inf) of bezlotoxumab after treatment of pediatric participants with bezlotoxumab is similar when compared to the AUC0-inf of bezlotoxumab after treatment of adults with bezlotoxumab.

Immunogenicity, Safety and Tolerability of a Plant-Derived Seasonal VLP Quadrivalent Influenza Vaccine...
Virus DiseasesRNA Virus Infections2 moreThis is a multiple sites phase II trial, randomized, observer-blind, dose ranging, placebo-controlled study to evaluate the immunogenicity, safety, and tolerability of a single intramuscular injection of plant-based Seasonal VLP Quadrivalent Influenza Vaccine administered in elderly subjects (50 years old and more). A total of four hundred fifty (450) subjects will be randomized in six (6) groups of 75 subjects to receive one injection of either a non-adjuvanted low, medium or high dose level of VLP, a low or high dose level of VLP of the quadrivalent VLP influenza vaccine combined with Alhydrogel® as adjuvant or the placebo preparation (100 millimolar (mM) phosphate buffer + 150 mM sodium chloride (NaCl) + 0.01% Tween 80)

Immunogenicity of HPV Vaccine in Immunosuppressed Children
Autoimmune DiseaseJuvenile Idiopathic Arthritis4 moreGenital HPV is the necessary cause for cervical cancer, as well as a major contributing cause of several other cancers and conditions. There are now effective vaccines against the main oncogenic HPV types, HPV16 and 18. Most research and discussion has focused on targeting the vaccine to young women and older adolescents. Based on this, a national free HPV vaccination program for adolescent girls commenced in 2007, in Australia. However, at the time of commencement, there had been no research on the use of this vaccine in immunosuppressed. Therefore, information on the immunogenicity, safety and duration of efficacy of HPV vaccine when administered to immunosuppressed children is needed. This trial looked at a 3 dose schedule of quadrivalent HPV vaccine in a range of immunosuppressed children, with the endpoint being immunogenicity, followed for 5 years for duration of immunity.

Wound Infections Following Implant Removal
Surgical Wound InfectionIn the Netherlands about 18,000 surgical procedures with implant removal are annually performed after fracture healing, of which 30-80% concern the foot, ankle and lower leg region. For clean surgical procedures, the rate of postoperative wound infections (POWIs) should be less than 5%. However, rates of 10-12% following implant removal, specifically after foot, ankle and lower leg fractures are reported. Currently, surgeons decide individually if antibiotics prophylaxis is given, since no guideline exists. This leads to undesirable practice variation. Therefore, the investigators propose a double-blind randomized controlled trial (RCT) in patients scheduled for implant removal following a foot, ankle or lower leg fracture, to assess the (cost-)effectiveness of a single gift of antibiotic prophylaxis. Primary outcome is a POWI within 30 days after implant removal. Secondary outcomes are quality of life, functional outcome at 30 days and 6 months after implant removal and costs. With 2 x 250 patients a decrease in POWI from 10% to 3.3% (expected rate in clean-contaminated elective orthopedic trauma procedures) can be detected (Power=80%, 2-sided alpha=5%, including 15% lost to follow up). If the assumption of the investigators, that prophylactic antibiotics prior to implant removal reduces the infectious complication rate, is confirmed by this RCT, this will offer a strong argument to adopt a single gift of antibiotic prophylaxis as standard practice of care. This will reduce the incidence of POWIs and consequently will lead to less physical and social disabilities and health care use. In addition, it will decrease the rate of use of empiric broad-spectrum antibiotics (and antibiotic resistance) prescribed upon suspicion or diagnosis of a POWI. A preliminary, conservative estimation suggests yearly cost savings in the Netherlands of €3.5 million per year.

Safety and Efficacy of DAV132 in Patients at High-Risk for Clostridium Difficile Infection (CDI)...
Clostridium Difficile InfectionThe purpose of this study is to determine the safe use and evaluate the efficacy/performance of DAV132 in hospitalized patients at high risk for Clostridium difficile infection (CDI) and who receive fluoroquinolones (FQs) for the treatment of acute infections or for prophylaxis of febrile neutropenia.