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Every central service (CS) department should have a designated educator. In fact, I believe that the need for a well-trained educator in this department is as great – if not greater -- than for any other department in the hospital. 

Their locations in the hospital may be disparate, but the infection prevention and sterile processing departments share a common goal -- pro-tecting the welfare and safety of patients. To achieve the level of communication and collaboration necessary to uphold this objective, both departments must understand the role they play, says Sharon Greene-Golden, CRCST, FCS, sterile processing manager for DePaul Medical Cen-ter, a part of Bon Secours Health System in Virginia.

Most people think parasitic diseases occur in poor and developing countries, or are infections they might pick up on a trip to a foreign country. However, parasitic infections also occur in the United States, and in some cases affect millions of people. Often they can go unnoticed, with few symptoms. But many times the infections cause serious illnesses, including seizures, blindness, pregnancy complications, heart failure, and even death. Anyone-regardless of race or economic status-can become infected.

A new study suggests that people who survived the medieval mass-killing plague known as the Black Death lived significantly longer and were healthier than people who lived before the epidemic struck in 1347. Caused by the bacteria Yersinia pestis, the Black Death wiped out 30 percent of Europeans and nearly half of Londoners during its initial four-year wave from 1347 to 1351. Released May 7 in the journal PLOS ONE, the study by University of South Carolina anthropologist Sharon DeWitte provides the first look at how the plague, called bubonic plague today, shaped population demographics and health for generations.

Indiana University biologists will receive more than $6.2 million from the U.S. Army Research Office to study how bacteria evolve in response to both their internal, population-influenced environments and their external natural environment.