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Background Point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) is a tool in increasing use, but there is still a lack of basics for its routine use and evidence of its impact in intensive care. Objective To measure the impact of POCUS on resource utilization, diagnostic accuracy, and clinical management in medical-surgical intensive care units (ICUs). Methods Prospective, controlled study, in two polyvalent ICUs. The patients were randomly assigned to POCUS or control group. Interventions POCUS patients received systematic ultrasound examination of optic nerve, lung/pleura, heart, abdomen, and venous system, performed at the bedside by trained intensivists. Control patients were treated by critical care specialists who do not perform ultrasound in their clinical practice. Results We included 80 patients, 40 per group. There were no significant differences in age, sex, APACHE II score, or admission diagnosis. POCUS group used fewer resources per patient in the first 5 days of hospitalization: chest radiography (2.6 ± 2.0 vs 4.1 ± 3.5, P = 0.01), additional ultrasound evaluations performed by a radiology specialist (0.6 ± 0.7 vs 1.1 ± 0.7, P = 0.002), and computed tomography studies (0.5 ± 0.6 vs 0.9 ± 0.7, P = 0.007). Time to perform any requested ultrasound evaluation after ICU admission was 2.1 ± 1.6 h versus 7.7 ± 6.7 h (P = 0.001). Systematic ultrasound evaluation led to better characterization of ICU admission diagnosis in 14 (35%) patients and change in clinical management in 24 (60%). POCUS group had lower fluid balance at 48 and 96 h after admission (P = 0.01) and spent less time mechanically ventilated (5.1 ± 5.7 days vs 8.8 ± 9.4, P = 0.03). Conclusions Systematic application of POCUS may decrease utilization of conventional diagnostic imaging resources and time of mechanical ventilation, and facilitate meticulous intravenous fluid administration in critically ill patients during the first week of stay in the ICU. Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03608202.

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ᰔThe presence of aac(6Ј)-Ib-cr is associated with decreased susceptibility to aminoglycosides (kanamycin, amikacin, and tobramycin) and to norfloxacin and ciprofloxacin (9). This allelic variant of aac(6Ј)-Ib was found to be linked to the extendedspectrum ␤-lactamase (ESBL) gene bla in isolates from many countries (4, 6, 7), while association of aac(6Ј)-Ib with the bla CTX-M-2 ESBL gene has been widely reported in Uruguay and Argentina (3,11).In this work we looked for the presence of aac(6Ј)-Ib and the aac(6Ј)-Ib-cr variant and their putative ESBL coresistance markers in fecal isolates of enterobacteria resistant to ciprofloxacin and/or ceftazidime from inpatients in an intensive care unit (ICU) in Montevideo, Uruguay.From 1 March to 31 October 2006, 106 patients were admitted to this ICU and followed daily until discharge. Rectal swabs obtained at 1, 4, 7, 10, 13, and 16 days after admission were plated on MacConkey agar plus ceftazidime (4 mg/liter) or ciprofloxacin (2 mg/liter). Enterobacterial isolates were identified by classical methods, including only the first isolate of each bacterial species per patient in this study.Antibiotic resistance profiling, screening, and confirmatory testing for ESBL detection were performed by disk diffusion assay, and results were interpreted following the CLSI guidelines (2).A total of 58/106 patients (55.2%) were colonized with ciprofloxacin-and/or ceftazidime-resistant enterobacteria, and 68 isolates were included in this study. Of these, 48 were resistant to gentamicin and 24 to amikacin (Table 1).All aminoglycoside-resistant isolates were screened for aac(6Ј)-Ib by PCR; amplicons were analyzed by restriction with BstF5I, as described by Park et al. (8). PCR products that were not digested by the enzyme [tentatively assigned to aac(6Ј)-Ibcr] were confirmed to contain aac(6Ј)-Ib-cr by double-strand sequencing. Only two Escherichia coli isolates were positive for aac(6Ј)-Ib-cr detection.Recalling the observed links between bla CTX-M-15 and aac(6Ј) 6,7) and between aac(6Ј)Ib and bla CTX-M-2 , the two aac(6Ј)-Ib-cr-positive isolates were further analyzed by PCR to detect CTX-M-1 and CTX-M-2 group ESBL genes using previously described primers (3, 5). Both isolates were positive only for CTX-M-1 group genes, identified as bla CTX-M-15 after sequencing.Both isolates were obtained at the time of patient admission into the ICU and showed identical pulsed-field gel electrophoresis patterns (10). Both patients were previously hospitalized before ICU admission, suggesting that this strain could be endemic in the hospital, where it could be horizontally transferred. All the other E. coli isolates yielded different pulsotypes (data not shown) compared with these.PCR assays for the detection of class 1 integrons and ISCR1 elements were performed according to the method of Di Conza et al. (3). Both isolates carried a class 1 integron containing the dfr17 and aadA5 gene cassettes, while ISCR1 elements were not detected.So far we have not been able to transfer these resistance genes, e...