Planning Considerations and Lessons Learned From a COVID-19 Mass Community Vaccination Center.

The emergency use authorization for multiple coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccines came at a pivotal time for the USA. In January 2021, the country exceeded 400,000 deaths from COVID-19. The USA aimed to quickly distribute and administer the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, with bright prospects for an additional emergency use authorization for Johnson and Johnson/Janssen's single-dose vaccine on the horizon. Part of the National Strategy for COVID-19 Response and Pandemic Preparedness was to "mount a safe, effective, comprehensive vaccination campaign" so the administration set a goal to have 100 million fully vaccinated citizens after the first 100 days in office. In order to fuel the rapid administration of vaccines, the Department of Health and Human Services was tasked to stand up new, federally supported Community Vaccination Centers across the country. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) was the lead agency entrusted to expedite financial assistance, allocate federal equipment and supplies, and deploy federal personnel to states, tribes, territories, and other eligible applicants for vaccination efforts. Early in the process of staffing sites, FEMA recognized the need to bolster the efforts with active duty military personnel and asked for manning assistance from the Department of Defense. As a result, 222 U.S. Air Force personnel were tasked with supporting the FEMA COVID-19 vaccination operations at NRG stadium, Houston, Texas. This reflection aims to cover the lessons learned and provide meaningful insight for future mass medical operations.

Rapid screening of invasive fungal infections in the hospital setting using the (1,3)-ß-D-glucan assay.

Disseminated candidiasis and other invasive fungal infections are a substantial cause of morbidity and mortality in immunocompromised and critically ill patients. Diagnosis of disseminated candidiasis via blood culture and skin biopsy can be unreliable and may delay treatment. (1,3)-ß-D-glucan (BDG) assay is a rapid, cost-effective, noninvasive diagnostic screening tool for the dermatology hospitalist to consider.

Temporal shifts in the collective dermatologic microbiome of military trainees.

BACKGROUND:  New military members undergo a highly-regimented 7-week training course during which trainees live and work within the same group of approximately 50 subjects for nearly 24 hours a day. This creates an optimal environment for assessing the impact of communal living on the collective skin microbiome. PURPOSE: The objective of this pilot study was to investigate dynamic changes of the skin microbiome in basic military trainees (BMT), in light of the unique environmental influences faced by this population. PATIENTS AND METHODS:  We evaluated collective changes in the skin microbiome of normal healthy adult basic trainees in response to communal living and universal Group A Strep prophylaxis with penicillin over the course of their initial 7-week training course. Samples from 10 flights of trainees were collected by swabbing upon arrival at Lackland AFB for their training (week 0) which is prior to prophylaxis with penicillin, at the 4 week point, and at the conclusion of their 7-week course of basic military training. Three separate high-throughput sequencing platforms and three bioinformatic pipeline analysis tools were utilized to assess the data. RESULTS: At all three time points we found that the top three bacterial genus identified were Propionibacterium, Staphylococcus, and Corynebacterium. We detected a community membership difference between the initial week 0 samples and the week 4 and 7 samples. A strong inverse correlation between Propionibacterium and Staphylococcus was noted with Propionibacterium being high at week 0 and much lower at weeks 4 and 7; conversely, Staphylococcus was low at week 0 and higher at weeks 4 and 7, this relationship was noted in both the individual and collective specimens. CONCLUSION: The collective dermatologic microbiome in the military trainee population examined exhibited a relative increase in Staphylococcus and Corynebacterium abundance coupled with a relative decrease in Propionibacterium abundance in this observational pilot study. Additional studies are needed to further assess the causal impact of communal living and widespread penicillin chemoprophylaxis.

Eccrine Angiomatous Hamartoma: A Clinicopathologic Review of 18 Cases.

BACKGROUND: Eccrine angiomatous hamartoma (EAH) is a benign cutaneous lesion defined by the proliferation of hamartomatous eccrine and capillary-like vascular elements in the dermis. However, the epidemiologic, morphologic, and histopathologic aspects of this uncommon disorder have yet to be fully delineated. METHODS: The authors retrospectively reviewed 18 EAH cases (including 14 accompanying skin biopsy specimens) diagnosed at 4 American university hospitals from 1996 to 2014. RESULTS: Patients ranged from 3 days to 84 years at time of diagnosis with a median age of 15 years. A male:female ratio of 11:7 was observed. Sixty-seven percent of cases presented in the extremities, but lesions in the trunk and head/neck regions also occurred. Four patients had multiple lesions, and 2 displayed a segmental pattern. Histologically, dermal vascular dilatation and acanthosis often accompanied EAH's typical eccrine and vascular comingling. One individual developed EAH at the site of a recurrent squamous cell carcinoma after previous excision. CONCLUSIONS: Although previously thought to occur primarily as a solitary angiomatous-appearing malformation on the extremities of children, EAH may develop with some frequency in adults and may manifest in a multifocal linear distribution. The authors also raise additional histopathologic consideration in support of the vascular theory of histogenesis for this condition.

Fibroelastolytic papulosis: histopathologic confirmation of disease spectrum variants in a single case.

Fibroelastolytic papulosis is a rare, acquired fibroelastolytic disorder that presents clinically as white-to-yellow papules and plaques most commonly occurring on the neck of elderly patients. The term fibroelastolytic papulosis encompasses two closely related conditions previously described as pseudoxanthoma elasticum-like papillary dermal elastolysis (PDE) and white fibrous papulosis of the neck (WFPN). Here we present a case of a 78-year-old white female with a several-year history of numerous, asymptomatic 2-3 mm yellowish, non-follicular papules distributed symmetrically over the posterior neck, axillae, arm and antecubital fossae. Histopathologic examination revealed thickened and clumped elastotic fibers admixed with thick, sclerotic appearing collagen bundles in the mid and deep reticular dermis. Rare melanophages, loss of vertically oriented elastic fibers and scattered elastotic globes were noted in the papillary dermis. Based on the shared clinicopathologic features showed in this case, strong consideration should be made for the additional inclusion of papillary dermal elastosis as existing along the disease continuum of fibroelastolytic papulosis. This occurrence of fibroelastolytic papulosis shows unique histopathologic findings of pseudoxanthoma elasticum-like PDE, papillary dermal elastosis and WFPN, further supporting the theory that these entities exist as variants along the fibroelastolytic papulosis spectrum.

Skin diseases associated with Agent Orange and other organochlorine exposures.

Organochlorine exposure is an important cause of cutaneous and systemic toxicity. Exposure has been associated with industrial accidents, intentional poisoning, and the use of defoliants, such as Agent Orange in the Vietnam War. Although long-term health effects are systematically reviewed by the Institute of Medicine, skin diseases are not comprehensively assessed. This represents an important practice gap as patients can present with cutaneous findings. This article provides a systematic review of the cutaneous manifestations of known mass organochlorine exposures in military and industrial settings with the goal of providing clinically useful recommendations for dermatologists seeing patients inquiring about organochlorine effects. Patients with a new diagnosis of chloracne, porphyria cutanea tarda, cutaneous lymphomas (non-Hodgkin lymphoma), and soft-tissue sarcomas including dermatofibrosarcoma protuberans and leiomyosarcomas should be screened for a history of Vietnam service or industrial exposure. Inconclusive evidence exists for an increased risk of other skin diseases in Vietnam veterans exposed to Agent Orange including benign fatty tumors, melanomas, nonmelanoma skin cancers, milia, eczema, dyschromias, disturbance of skin sensation, and rashes not otherwise specified. Affected veterans should be informed of the uncertain data in those cases. Referral to Department of Veterans Affairs for disability assessment is indicated for conditions with established associations.

Occluded Cigarette Smoke Exposure Causing Localized Chloracne-Like Comedones.

Many environmental acne disorders, including chloracne and oil acne, were previously thought to occur predominantly in occupational settings following polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon exposure. Cigarette smoke has also been shown to contain a large number of these toxic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon components and strictly correlates with noninflammatory acneiform lesion development in postadolescent patients. We report a case of localized open comedones associated with occluded cigarette smoke exposure near the nasal cavity due to infrequently changed gauze following rhinectomy. The dermal uptake of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon components in cigarette smoke has the potential to function as a contributing factor in chloracne development. Several of these environmental and noninflammatory acne subtypes may share a common molecular propensity for enhanced comedogenesis originating from aryl hydrocarbon receptor pathway effects in the skin. Additional studies are needed to further elucidate the exact mechanistic pathways through which tobacco smoke impacts the integumentary system.

Quantitative computerized two-point correlation analysis of lung CT scans correlates with pulmonary function in pulmonary sarcoidosis.

BACKGROUND: Chest CT scans are commonly used to clinically assess disease severity in patients presenting with pulmonary sarcoidosis. Despite their ability to reliably detect subtle changes in lung disease, the utility of chest CT scans for guiding therapy is limited by the fact that image interpretation by radiologists is qualitative and highly variable. We sought to create a computerized CT image analysis tool that would provide quantitative and clinically relevant information. METHODS: We established that a two-point correlation analysis approach reduced the background signal attendant to normal lung structures, such as blood vessels, airways, and lymphatics while highlighting diseased tissue. This approach was applied to multiple lung fields to generate an overall lung texture score (LTS) representing the quantity of diseased lung parenchyma. Using deidentified lung CT scan and pulmonary function test (PFT) data from The Ohio State University Medical Center's Information Warehouse, we analyzed 71 consecutive CT scans from patients with sarcoidosis for whom simultaneous matching PFTs were available to determine whether the LTS correlated with standard PFT results. RESULTS: We found a high correlation between LTS and FVC, total lung capacity, and diffusing capacity of the lung for carbon monoxide (P < .0001 for all comparisons). Moreover, LTS was equivalent to PFTs for the detection of active lung disease. The image analysis protocol was conducted quickly (< 1 min per study) on a standard laptop computer connected to a publicly available National Institutes of Health ImageJ toolkit. CONCLUSIONS: The two-point image analysis tool is highly practical and appears to reliably assess lung disease severity. We predict that this tool will be useful for clinical and research applications.