Most Dutch travel health nurses aspire to prescribe and feel competent to prescribe. Further education is required before implementing nurse prescribing in travel medicine. As this is the first study to focus on nurse prescribing in travel medicine, evaluation of travel nurse prescribing is strongly recommended and should start directly after the new responsibilities

are implemented. The authors declare that they have no competing interests. “
“We sought to evaluate and provide better itinerary-specific care to precounseled travelers and to assess diseases occurring while traveling abroad by surveying a community population. An additional quality improvement initiative was to expand our post-travel survey to

be a more valuable tool in Fulvestrant in vitro gathering high-quality quantitative ABT-737 data. From de-identified data collected via post-travel surveys, we identified a cohort of 525 patients for a retrospective observational analysis. We analyzed illness encountered while abroad, medication use, and whether a physician was consulted. We also examined itinerary variables, including continents and countries visited. The 525 post-travel surveys collected showed that the majority of respondents traveled to Asia (31%) or Africa (30%). The mean number of travel days was 21.3 (median, 14). Univariate analysis demonstrated a statistically significant increase of risk for general illness when comparing travel duration of less than 14 days to greater than 14 days (11.3% vs 27.7%, p < 0.001). Duration of travel was also significant with regard to development of traveler's diarrhea (TD) (p = 0.0015). Destination of travel and development of traveler's diarrhea trended toward significance. Serious illness requiring a physician visit was infrequent, as were vaccine-related complications.

Despite pre-travel counseling, traveler’s diarrhea was the most common illness in our cohort; expanded prevention strategies will be necessary to lower the impact that diarrheal illness has on generally healthy travelers. Overall rates of illness did not vary by destination; however, there was a strong association between duration of travel and likelihood of illness. To further identify specific variables contributing to travel-related disease, including Mannose-binding protein-associated serine protease patient co-morbidities, reason for travel, and accommodations, the post-travel survey has been modified and expanded. A limitation of this study was the low survey response rate (18%); to improve the return rate, we plan to implement supplemental modalities including email and a web-based database. In 2011, as reported by the World Tourism Organization, 980 million travelers crossed an international border. This number contrasts with 675 million international departures of only 10 years ago.[1] Following this explosive increase in international travel, the practice of travel medicine continues to grow.