title: [Clinical investigation of outbreak of nosocomial severe acute respiratory syndrome].
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To summarize and analyze the clinical manifestation, diagnosis and therapeutic strategy of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), and its characteristics of outbreak in hospital via infection transmission cluster associated with SARS patients.
  
  
  METHODS
  (1) Two hospitalized community acquired SARS cases with their clinical data and epidemiologically linked transmission clusters in our hospital were analyzed; (2) The clinical data from 41 SARS cases were summarized.
  
  
  RESULTS
  (1) The contagiousness of SARS virus in SARS patients was extremely strong, especially in their acute stage. (2) The majority of clinical manifestations were fever (100% cases), and there were no obvious respiratory symptoms in more than half of the patients (53.7%) at early SARS stage (day 1 to day 3), accompanied by leucopenia(52.6%) and lymphopenia (68.4%). (3) Timely administration of Ribavirin, Methylprednisolone, immunoenhancer (such as interferon alpha-2b, thymosin-alpha1) to SARS patients was efficacious to certain extent in controlling the development of the disease.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  It is very important for clinicians to pay great attention to protect themselves from infection of SARS. Early discovery of SARS, early isolation of SARS patients, and early treatment are very helpful to improving patient's prognosis and controlling SARS overspread.
authors.affiliation: Department of Respiratory Medicine, Peking University People's Hospital, Beijing 100044, China.
authors.forename: Zhan-cheng
authors.initials: ZC
authors.lastname: Gao
authors.forename: Ji-hong
authors.initials: JH
authors.lastname: Zhu
authors.forename: Yan
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Sun
authors.forename: Xiu-lan
authors.initials: XL
authors.lastname: Ding
authors.forename: Ji-shun
authors.initials: JS
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.forename: Yu-xian
authors.initials: YX
authors.lastname: Cui
authors.forename: Xiang-ke
authors.initials: XK
authors.lastname: Du
authors.forename: Tong
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Gao
authors.forename: Quan-ying
authors.initials: QY
authors.lastname: He
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D002681:China / Q000453:epidemiology; D017714:Community-Acquired Infections / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000628:therapy / Q000821:virology; D003428:Cross Infection / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000628:therapy* / Q000821:virology; D004196:Disease Outbreaks; D018562:Disease Transmission, Infectious; D005192:Family Health; D017809:Fatal Outcome; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D017758:Infectious Disease Transmission, Patient-to-Professional; D008168:Lung / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000473:pathology / Q000821:virology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010375:Pedigree; D011379:Prognosis; D011859:Radiography; D045169:Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000628:therapy* / Q000635:transmission; D013997:Time Factors