John W. Nuzum

Bio: John W. Nuzum is an academic researcher. The author has contributed to research in topics: Population & Acute Poliomyelitis. The author has an hindex of 4, co-authored 10 publications receiving 184 citations.

1918 pandemic influenza and pneumonia in a large civil hospital.

Abstract: Following the reports of a rapidly spreading and highly fatal pandemic of influenza and pneumonia in the Eastern States, and while the epidemic of influenza was raging at the Great Lakes Naval Training Station, a severe outbreak of this disease appeared among the civil population of Chicago. During the past five weeks, from September 23 to October 29, more than 2,000 patients were admitted to the wards of Cook County Hospital. Of these, 642 died, a mortality of 31 per cent. . . . The age period of highest mortality falls between 25 and 30 years.

Pandemic influenza and pneumonia in a large civil hospital

Abstract: Following the reports of a rapidly spreading and highly fatal pandemic of influenza and pneumonia in the Eastern States, and while the epidemic of influenza was raging at the Great Lakes Naval Training Station, a severe outbreak of this disease appeared among the civil population of Chicago. During the past five weeks, from September 23 to October 29, more than 2,000 patients were admitted to the wards of Cook County Hospital. Of these, 642 died, a mortality of 31 per cent. In the accompanying chart, of the first 500 deaths, it will be noted that the age period of highest mortality falls between 25 and 30 years. Among the total number of admissions during this period there were 122 soldiers, and thus far twenty-one cases have terminated fatally—a mortality of 16 per cent. So far as the admissions to a large charity institution, such as the Cook County Hospital, may

Experimental studies in the etiology of acute epidemic poliomyelitis

Abstract: For several years it has appeared that the etiology of acute epidemic poliomyelitis has been successfully cleared up by the work of Landsteiner and Popper 1 and by that of Flexner 2 and his co-workers, Lewis, Noguchi and others. Landsteiner and Popper in 1908 first succeeded in transferring the disease to various species of monkeys by intraperitoneal inoculation of human poliomyelitic brain and cord. They were able to produce a disease in the monkey which in its clinical, pathologic and histologic features was quite similar to acute poliomyelitis in man. According to these workers, mice, rats, guineapigs, dogs, cats, goats, sheep and horses proved refractile to the disease. Many conflicting statements occur in the literature as to whether or not the virus of poliomyelitis can be transmitted to the rabbit. Krause and Meinicke assert that they have produced the disease in seven generations of rabbits, and more recently Rosenau and

The production of an antipoliomyelitic serum

Abstract: The many deplorable deformities attendant on infantile paralysis, together with the high mortality of recent epidemics, demands that a most intensive study be made to discover some therapeutic measure which may curtail the ravages of this disease. A study of the recent epidemics in Chicago, New York and elsewhere has revealed certain constant bacteriologic findings. What appears to be the same peculiar microorganism has been repeatedly isolated from the tonsils,1brain, spinal cords2and cerebrospinal fluids3of patients in widely separated cities. The presence of this polymorphous organism so constantly in the spinal fluid during life,4even shortly after the onset of the paralysis, and the discovery that the coccus remains in the spinal fluid and can be readily isolated in pure culture several weeks after the onset of the disease, not alone offers a most important clinical diagnostic procedure but also suggests at once a

Needless surgical operations from failure to recognize tabes dorsalis

Abstract: Within the past few years several writers, among them Cabot, 1 Hall 2 and Cheney 3 in this country, and Konig, 4 Lomnitz 5 and others in Europe, have directed attention to operations for supposedly local disease of the abdomen in patients with tabes in whom no disease was found at the laparotomy. Careful search through the literature fails to reveal more than casual reference to the frequency of such blunders. Surgeons performing laparotomies frequently are fully acquainted with this danger, but it is believed that the following study may stimulate still greater caution. In the past five years (1910-1915) over 1,000 cases of tabes dorsalis have been carefully studied in the Cook County Hospital on the neurologic services of Drs. Hall, Grinker, Hassin, Hamill and Kuh. These records have been examined to determine the relative frequency of the cardinal symptoms, the number of patients operated on, the frequency of

Predominant Role of Bacterial Pneumonia as a Cause of Death in Pandemic Influenza: Implications for Pandemic Influenza Preparedness

Abstract: Background Despite the availability of published data on 4 pandemics that have occurred over the past 120 years, there is little modern information on the causes of death associated with influenza pandemics.

Pandemic 2009 Influenza A(H1N1) Virus Illness Among Pregnant Women in the United States

Abstract: Context Early data on pandemic 2009 influenza A(H1N1) suggest pregnant women are at increased risk of hospitalization and death. Objective To describe the severity of 2009 influenza A(H1N1) illness and the association with early antiviral treatment among pregnant women in the United States. Design, Setting, and Patients Surveillance of 2009 influenza A(H1N1) in pregnant women reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) with symptom onset from April through December 2009. Main Outcome Measures Severity of illness (hospitalizations, intensive care unit [ICU] admissions, and deaths) due to 2009 influenza A(H1N1) among pregnant women, stratified by timing of antiviral treatment and pregnancy trimester at symptom onset. Results We received reports on 788 pregnant women in the United States with 2009 influenza A(H1N1) with symptom onset from April through August 2009. Among those, 30 died (5% of all reported 2009 influenza A[H1N1] influenza deaths in this period). Among 509 hospitalized women, 115 (22.6%) were admitted to an ICU. Pregnant women with treatment more than 4 days after symptom onset were more likely to be admitted to an ICU (56.9% vs 9.4%; relative risk [RR], 6.0; 95% confidence interval [CI], 3.5-10.6) than those treated within 2 days after symptom onset. Only 1 death occurred in a patient who received treatment within 2 days of symptom onset. Updating these data with the CDC's continued surveillance of ICU admissions and deaths among pregnant women with symptom onset through December 31, 2009, identified an additional 165 women for a total of 280 women who were admitted to ICUs, 56 of whom died. Among the deaths, 4 occurred in the first trimester (7.1%), 15 in the second (26.8%), and 36 in the third (64.3%); Conclusions Pregnant women had a disproportionately high risk of mortality due to 2009 influenza A(H1N1). Among pregnant women with 2009 influenza A(H1N1) influenza reported to the CDC, early antiviral treatment appeared to be associated with fewer admissions to an ICU and fewer deaths.

Viral infections during pregnancy.

Abstract: Viral infections during pregnancy have long been considered benign conditions with a few notable exceptions, such as herpes virus. The recent Ebola outbreak and other viral epidemics and pandemics show how pregnant women suffer worse outcomes (such as preterm labor and adverse fetal outcomes) than the general population and non-pregnant women. New knowledge about the ways the maternal-fetal interface and placenta interact with the maternal immune system may explain these findings. Once thought to be 'immunosuppressed', the pregnant woman actually undergoes an immunological transformation, where the immune system is necessary to promote and support the pregnancy and growing fetus. When this protection is breached, as in a viral infection, this security is weakened and infection with other microorganisms can then propagate and lead to outcomes, such as preterm labor. In this manuscript, we review the major viral infections relevant to pregnancy and offer potential mechanisms for the associated adverse pregnancy outcomes.

Interactions between influenza and bacterial respiratory pathogens: implications for pandemic preparedness

Abstract: It is commonly believed that the clinical and epidemiological characteristics of the next influenza pandemic will mimic those of the 1918 pandemic. Determinative beliefs regarding the 1918 pandemic include that infections were expressed as primary viral pneumonias and/or acute respiratory distress syndrome, that pandemic-related deaths were the end states of the natural progression of disease caused by the pandemic strain, and that bacterial superinfections caused relatively fewer deaths in 1918 than in subsequent pandemics. In turn, response plans are focused on developing and/or increasing inventories of a strain-specific vaccine, antivirals, intensive care beds, mechanical ventilators, and so on. Yet, there is strong and consistent evidence of epidemiologically and clinically important interactions between influenza and secondary bacterial respiratory pathogens, including during the 1918 pandemic. Countermeasures (eg, vaccination against pneumococcal and meningococcal disease before a pandemic; mass uses of antibiotic(s) with broad spectrums of activity against common bacterial respiratory pathogens during local epidemics) designed to prevent or mitigate the effects of influenza-bacterial interactions should be major focuses of pandemic-related research, prevention, and response planning.