We performed a prospective study of all patients with bacteremic pneumonia due to Staphylococcus aureus over a period of 6 years during an outbreak of methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA). Patients with bacteremic pneumonia due to MRSA (32 cases) or methicillin-susceptible S. aureus (MSSA; 54 cases) were compared. The patients with MRSA pneumonia were older and were more likely than those with MSSA pneumonia to have predisposing factors for acquisition of the infection. There were no differences in clinical findings, radiological pattern, or complications in clinical evolution among patients with MRSA and MSSA pneumonia. Mortality was significantly higher among MSSA-infected patients treated with vancomycin than among those treated with cloxacillin (47% vs. none; P<.01). Multivariate analysis (stepwise logistic regression method) showed a relationship between mortality and the following variables: septic shock (odds ratio [OR], 61), vancomycin treatment (OR, 14), and respiratory distress (OR, 8).

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Controlled branching processes are stochastic growth population models in which the number of individuals with reproductive capacity in each generation is controlled through a random control function. The purpose of this work is to examine the sequential Monte Carlo Approximate Bayesian Computation method and to propose appropriate summary statistics in the context of these processes. We show that the success of this methodology lies on this latter issue. The accuracy of the proposed method is illustrated and compared with a "likelihood free" Markov chain Monte Carlo technique by means of a simulated example. Moreover we illustrate how to extend this methodology to a controlled multitype branching