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For all hospitalized patients admitted in the first six months of 1999, we recorded the data relative to antibiotic therapy (TA) administered, establishing the period of treatment in days and the dosage, including any variations during the period in question. We calculated the prescribed daily dose (PDD) and were thus able to establish the expense incurred in antibiotic therapy, comparing the real overall cost per product used. For all patients, the discharge diagnosis was reported, and the whole case-study was aggregated into homogeneous groups. PDD was compared with DDD (defined daily doses). The Pareto curve was used to highlight the antibiotics with higher overall cost. Besides cotrimoxazole, ceftriaxone and ciprofloxacin were the antibiotics most frequently prescribed, while ceftriaxone, imipenem-cilastatine and vancomycin were the antibiotics incurring the greatest expense. With reference to the average duration of the treatment cycle, ceftriaxone (9.75 dd) and ciprofloxacin tbl (6.75 dd) were the only antibiotics (in monotherapy) used for less than 10 treatment days. Special attention was paid to analysing the TA costs in treating pneumonia, which accounted for the highest percentage of cases (50 cases). Ceftriaxone, especially pulmonary infections, was the most commonly used drug. In hospitalized subjects treated who show good therapeutic response, we recommend early discharge and continuation of the therapy at home (switch therapy). This strategy will allow the patient to return to his/her family in good time, also thereby reducing hospital management costs.

A survey of current mood disorders (and especially major depression) is performed after considering quoted literature over the last five years. The sample includes all the HIV-infected-patients continuously referred to the Outpatient Service of the Infectious Diseases dept. of Bologna's "Ospedale Maggiore" General Hospital during some five days (19-23rd, July 1993). Each of the 53 recruited subjects was seen by a psychiatrist in the same morning of his/her medical visit; then also BPRS, STAI, CGI, BDI and MADRS were administered. A psychiatric diagnosis has been found in the 45% of the sample. The results being discriminated on the basis of absence-presence and diagnostic category, they point out a significant prevalence of ARC among subjects with psychiatric diagnosis and prevalence of asymptomatic HIV-infection among those ones with absent psychiatric diagnosis. Drug dependence (72%) and personality disorder are markedly prominent among ARC patients. But the surprising outcome (lower than references data) is that the diagnosis of current major depression is found only in 1.9% of cases (mood disorder in 9.4%).