SUMMARY: Aerogenes‐cloacae and Intermediate types of coli‐aerogenes bacteria were found to be normal inhabitants of ears and panicles of growing cereals. Coli‐aerogenes bacteria, producing acid and gas in MacConkey's broth within 5 days at 30°, were isolated from 73% of the 148 samples, the number being as high as 105/g in a third. The number of organisms increased during the growing season. Less than a third of the samples contained 37° positive strains, but approximately 10% were positive in 10‐3g or less at this temperature. A high proportion (71.1%) of the 180 classifiable cultures did not produce acid and gas in MacConkey's broth in 2 days at 37°. Organisms of the aerogenes‐cloacae types were dominant, constituting 80.6% of the classifiable strains at 30° and 80.8% of the 37° positive strains. Intermediate type I, particularly 37° negative and gelatin liquefying variants, was the next most common type.

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A study of the psychrotrophic bacterial content, determined a t 3-5", of soil, grass and hay showed that these habitats were prolific sources of many different types of psychrotrophs, which sometimes exceeded lO'/g. Untreated farm water supplies had a much lower content, few samples giving colony counts >104/ml. Gram positive or Gram variable, nonsporeforming rods, resembling coryneform bacteria, constituted e relatively high proportion of the psyohrotrophic microflora of soil, Gram negative rods only forming about t of the isolates. In contrast, Pseudomonaa and Acinetobacter spp. and yellow or orange pigmented Gram negative rods were the predominant psychrotrophs in untreated water. Pseudomonao and a taxonomically heterogeneous group of yellow pigmented, Uram negative rods, a few of which resembled Plavobacterium and some Enoinia herbiwla, together with Acinetobacter accounted for nearly 90% of the isolates from grass, but < 60 % of those from hay, which had a more complex psychrotrophio microflora than had grms.[4201

Background Moral distress is well-documented among civilian critical care nurses and adversely affects patient outcomes, care delivery, and retention of health care providers. Despite its recognized significance, few studies have addressed moral distress in military critical care nurses. Objectives To refine and validate an instrument to assess moral distress in military critical care nurses. Methods This study examined moral distress in military critical care nurses (N = 245) using a new instrument, the Measure of Moral Distress for Healthcare Professionals–Military (MMD-HP-M). The psychometric properties of the refined scale were assessed by use of descriptive statistics, tests of reliability and validity, exploratory factor analysis, correlations, and qualitative analysis of open-ended responses. Results Initial testing showed promising evidence of instrument performance. The Cronbach α (0.94) suggested good internal consistency of the instrument for the overall sample. Scores for the MMD-HP items and the MMD-HP-M items showed a strong, significant correlation (α= 0.78, P &lt; .001). Unique attributes of military nursing that contribute to moral distress included resource access, futile care, and austere conditions. Exploratory factor analysis established a new military-centric factor for question items associated with inadequate training for patient care, providing care in resource-limited settings, and personal exhaustion. Conclusions These results will help guide specific, targeted interventions to reduce the negative effects of moral distress on our military health care providers, especially in terms of readiness for the next global pandemic and retention of these invaluable personnel.

SUMMARY: A series of co‐operative experiments was conducted to compare the bacterial colony counts of soil obtained by workers in different laboratories, using soil extract agar and other media for the determinations. In the earlier experiments it was not possible to obtain a reasonable degree of reproducibility of results between laboratories even when the plating technique was carefully prescribed. By modification and more rigid standardization of the technique closer agreement was obtained in subsequent experiments. It is suggested that when co‐operative investigations are contemplated the participating laboratories should check their technique by the examination of ‘control’ soils. No evidence could be obtained to support the suggestion that higher colony counts are obtained by the use of soil extract media containing extract prepared from the same soil as the sample tested. The source appears to be immaterial so long as the soil for extract preparation is not of extreme type and has been well manured and cultivated.