Loperamide in severe protracted diarrhoea.

Six infants with severe life-threatening protracted diarrhoea were treated with loperamide. Steady-state perfusion studies of the jejunum showed that in 2 of them the small intestine was in a net secretory state with respect to water, and in the others this was inferred from the fact that the diarrhoea persisted despite nothing by mouth. Loperamide resulted in a prompt and impressive improvement in the condition of each infant. We conclude that this drug has an important role in the management of protracted diarrhoeal states in some infants who are unresponsive to current treatments, and that its effect is related to its antisecretory action.     

Single stage bilateral common carotid artery stenting in a patient of Takayasu arteritis

Carotid angioplasty and stenting is increasingly becoming a safe and efficacious modality of treatment in the management of carotid artery stenosis. Although atherosclerosis is the predominant cause of this morbid disease, Takayasu arteritis assumes special importance in south east Asia. The diffuse nature of this disease with associated inflammation and scarring of the vessel make revascularisation difficult. We report a case of Takayasu arteritis in which a successful bilateral common carotid stenting was done in a single sitting.     

Evaluation of solid state properties of solid dispersions prepared by hot-melt extrusion and solvent co-precipitation

Milling processes are known to cause polymorphic transition in enantiotropic systems and the micronization process employed to produce microparticles for inhalation formulations has been reported to result in solid-state damage. The aim of the current work was to investigate the polymorphism of salmeterol xinafoate (SX) following antisolvent micronization from poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) solvents and compare this to the properties of SX conventionally crystallized and micronized. Powder X-ray diffraction revealed that SX crystallized predominantly as the SX form I polymorph following rapid precipitation from PEG solvents and cooling crystallization from propan-2-ol. Thermo-kinetic analysis using a modified Avrami-Erofe'ev equation was applied to differential scanning calorimetric thermographs of crystallized and micronized SX. The kinetic analysis revealed that SX crystallized from PEG solvents underwent significantly less or no re-crystallization of SX form II from the melt. A polymorphic transition was identified upon heating ball-milled SX, although the untreated material was resistant to such transformation. The thermal behaviour of SX crystallized from PEG solvents was consistent with a lower degree of crystal lattice disorder and higher enantiotropic purity than SX crystallized from propan-2-ol; the same was also true when comparing SX before and after micronization.     

Single-Center Experience Implementing the LOINC-RSNA Radiology Playbook for Adult Abdomen/Pelvis CT and MR Procedures Using a Semi-Automated Method

The LOINC-RSNA Radiology Playbook represents the future direction of standardization for radiology procedure names. We developed a software solution (“RadMatch”) utilizing Python 2.7 and FuzzyWuzzy, an open-source fuzzy string matching algorithm created by SeatGeek, to implement the LOINC-RSNA Radiology Playbook for adult abdomen and pelvis CT and MR procedures performed at our institution. Execution of this semi-automated method resulted in the assignment of appropriate LOINC numbers to 86% of local CT procedures. For local MR procedures, appropriate LOINC numbers were assigned to 75% of these procedures whereas 12.5% of local MR procedures could only be partially mapped. For the standardized local procedures, only 63% of CT and 71% of MR procedures had corresponding RadLex Playbook identifier (RPID) codes in the LOINC-RSNA Radiology Playbook, which limited the utility of RPID codes. RadMatch is a semi-automated open-source software tool that can assist radiology departments seeking to standardize their radiology procedures via implementation of the LOINC-RSNA Radiology Playbook.     

Correction to: Incidence and characteristics of metastatic intracranial lesions in stage III and IV melanoma: a single institute retrospective analysis

Journal of Neuro-Oncology - Meningiomas comprise 33% of all CNS tumors. The World Health Organization (WHO) describes meningiomas as benign (BM), atypical (AM), and malignant/anaplastic (MM)....