Plague Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Plague, including details on bubonic plague, yersinia pestis, infection, types, treatment.

Communicable respiratory threats in the ED: tuberculosis, influenza, SARS, and other aerosolized infections.

Rothman RE, Hsieh YH, Yang S

Department of Emergency Medicine, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA. rrothman@jhmi.edu

Respiratory infections are the most common communicable infectious diseases. EDs are the front line for patients with respiratory infections because of their acute nature and because the ED is the principal site of health care for those at highest risk. These diseases include influenza, tuberculosis, and measles, together accounting for 25% of infectious causes of death worldwide. These are emerging and biothreat agents that follow the same route of transmission, such as pneumonic plague. We discuss epidemiology, pathogenesis, diagnosis, and treatment of each agent. Emphasis is on the ED's role as a public health prevention arena, with attention to education and disease prevention, early identification of disease in patients at risk, and reduction of illnesses.

Published 19 September 2006 in Emerg Med Clin North Am, 24(4): 989-1017.
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