disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), was deemed a pandemic by the World Health Organization. 1 To date, there have been no federally approved treatments for COVID-19 in the United States. The use of convalescent plasma has been studied during this pandemic as an emerging possible treatment. 2-5 This therapy relies on "passive immunity," in which the pathogen-specific antibodies in blood plasma, donated by people who have recovered from an infectious disease, are transferred by transfusion into the bloodstream of a patient with active infection. The use of convalescent plasma has been studied in other re

A patient with relapsed/refractory B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia developed babesiosis prior to allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation while on atovaquone for Pneumocystis jirovecii pneumonia prophylaxis. Despite receiving a prolonged course of atovaquone and azithromycin until whole blood Babesia microti DNA was no longer detected by polymerase chain reaction, her post-transplant course was complicated by relapsed babesiosis. We investigate the potential host and parasite characteristics causing relapsing/persistent infection.

We compared risk of recurrent fever in patients with acute myeloid leukemia undergoing induction chemotherapy with febrile neutropenia without an infectious source in which antibacterials were de-escalated before neutrophil recovery versus continued. There was less recurrent fever when antibacterials were de-escalated early with no increased adverse events.

Cytomegalovirus (CMV) retinitis in hematologic malignancies in the absence of hematopoietic cell transplant (HCT) is uncommon. We report a case of a 54-year-old woman with peripheral T-cell lymphoma who develops CMV retinitis and subsequently undergoes an autologous HCT, with eventual development of immune reconstitution uveitis. We further reviewed the PubMed literature on CMV retinitis in patients with lymphoma. We describe that CMV retinitis in patients with lymphoma has variable clinical presentations, may occur at any time during the course of the disease and chemotherapy, and is associated with significant morbidity. K E Y W O R D SCytomegalovirus, hematopoietic cell transplantation, immune reconstitution uveitis, lymphoma, retinitis

Objective: Tracheal intubation and mechanical ventilation provide essential support for patients with respiratory failure, but the course of mechanical ventilation may be complicated by adverse ventilator-associated events (VAEs), which may or may not be associated with infection. We sought to understand how the frequency of subglottic suction, an indicator of the quantity of sputum produced by ventilated patients, relates to the onset of all VAEs and infection-associated VAEs. Design: We performed a case-crossover study including 87 patients with VAEs, and we evaluated 848 days in the pre-VAE period at risk for a VAE. Setting and participants: Critically ill patients were recruited from the medical intensive care unit of an academic medical center. Methods: We used the number of as-needed subglottic suctioning events performed per calendar day to quantify sputum production, and we compared the immediate pre-VAE period to the preceding period. We used CDC surveillance definitions for VAE and to categorize whether events were infection associated or not. Results: Sputum quantity measured by subglottic suction frequency is greater in the period immediately prior to VAE than in the preceding period. However, it does not discriminate well between infection-associated VAEs and VAEs without associated infection. Conclusions: Subglottic suction frequency may serve as a valuable marker of sputum quantity, and it is associated with risk of a VAE. However, our results require validation in a broader population of mechanically ventilated patients and intensive care settings.