Value of Doppler ultrasound for the diagnosis of renal artery stenosis in children

To evaluate the reliability of Doppler ultrasonography (US) in identifying children with renal artery stenosis (RAS) among those with hypertension, we compared Doppler US results in 22 hypertensive children (mean age 8.9±4.3 years), with (13 cases) and without RAS at angiography, and in 33 normotensive children (mean age 8.8±4.7 years). We observed 2 false-negatives and 2 false-positives with Doppler US. Of the 2 false-negative diagnoses, 1 had RAS on an accessory renal artery located behind a normal upper polar artery and the other was observed in a patient with bilateral multiple stenosis of the very distal segments of renal arteries. The 2 false-positive diagnoses were due to sinuous left renal artery and to technical reasons, respectively. In another patient, Doppler US showed a tight RAS, while arteriography was normal. RAS was subsequently confirmed by a second arteriography. Peak systolic velocity values of Doppler US were significantly higher in patients with proven angiographic RAS (3.44±0.66 m/s) than in hypertensive patients with normal renal arteries at angiography (0.99±0.35 m/s, P <0.0001) and normotensive healthy children (1.04±0.23 m/s, P <0.0001). With the use of multiple views, and the experience acquired with practice, false-negatives or false-positives due to the geometry of the renal artery can be avoided. Nevertheless, very distal stenosis can be missed by Doppler US. Received October 30, 1995; received in revised form April 16, 1996; accepted May 14, 1996     

Surgical treatment of stapes fixation

The aim of surgical treatment of a fixed stapes is to restore an as effective as possible impedance transfer of the ossicular chain and acoustic impedance of the annular ligament of the footplate, when it has lost elasticity, and this in order to achieve the best possible physiological vibration of the inner ear fluids.     

Hepatobiliary scintigraphy in a patient with bilhemia

A 4-year-old child referred for acute jaundice following percutaneous needle biopsy of the liver underwent hepatobiliary scintigraphy. Although all conventional liver tests suggested preservation of hepatocyte function, the tracer uptake in the liver appeared dramatically reduced at scintigraphy and the blood pool activity did not decrease significantly until the end of the study. Visualization of the bile ducts indicated, however, that the tracer was taken up by the hepatocyte and further excreted into the biliary tree. There was no tracer pooling in the biliary tree although no bowel activity was observed, even on delayed images. The association of persistent blood pool activity, bile duct visualization without tracer pooling, and nonvisualization of the bowel was caused by a continuous recirculation of the tracer from the biliary tree into the bloodstream. The presence of a biliovenous fistula was further proven by percutaneous transhepatic cholangiography performed 24 h later. Since 1975, only 16 cases of bilhemia have been reported. To the best of our knowledge the scintigraphic pattern of this rare but lifethreatening complication has not previously been reported.     

双联抗血小板疗法预防缺血再发

本文对应用双联抗血小板聚集药在预防缺血再发方面较应用单药的优势进行了探讨.动脉粥样硬化是一种隐袭性的全身性过程,可累及多处血管床,包括脑动脉、冠状动脉和周围动脉.粥样硬化斑块破裂是血小板活化、聚集和血栓形成进程中的刺激因素之一.因为该病是沿着整个脉管系统发展的,所以对有任何一种动脉粥样硬化临床表现的患者来说,其他血管床也极易受到侵犯.不同的血管病有着共同的易患危险因素.缺血性冠心病和脑血管病是美国三大常见死亡原因中的两种.阿司匹林在心肌梗死和卒中的二级预防方面的有效性已在众多的研究中得到证实.潘生丁在降低心肌梗死、卒中和血管性死亡方面并不比阿司匹林更好,但噻氯匹定和氯吡格雷却明显优于阿司匹林.目前正在进行评估联合应用抗血小板聚集药预防缺血再发的有效性的临床研究.体外试验和临床研究均支持联合应用两种机制不同的抗血小板聚集药的理论.双联应用抗血小板聚集疗法可增强对血小板聚集和血栓形成的抑制作用.联合应用抗血小板聚集药以不同的作用机制抑制血栓形成途径中的多个位点,有可能进一步改善患者远期临床转归.＃在预防缺血再发方面,应用双联抗血小板聚集药较应用单药可能更具优势.     

Chemins vers la clinique

The author focuses attention or institutional psychotherapy and draws its clinical, philosophical and also ethical concepts in order to prove that an administrative logic of the mental institutions only leads to loose what characterise healing process. Three main axis are tackled: the concept of reaction, the concept of pathoplasty and the concept of alienation. The concept of reaction makes understandable how the atmosphere of an institution is exercising a so great influence on its patients' symptoms that a self-governing endogenic psychopathological process “that is turned away from its initial cause” is created. That results in the concept of pathoplasty, which refers to the fact that some aspects of the pathology are induced by the institution itself, from which result two main ideas of the institutional psychotherapy: a) an institution is to tie down to an auto analysis to heal its own pathological functioning; b) all the more so that an institution which doesn't could become iatrogenic. The concept of alienation is approached through the historical and philosophical aspects of the Marxist view. The author use Bataille's differentiation between restricted economy “which is in keeping with a capitalist one, susceptible of an accountable evaluation” - and general economy - which confus to negativity as a foundation for an inner social work, apart from any accountable evaluation to Hegel's mind for instance, desire is indissociable from the psychiatric heal.     

Comparison of the inflammatory response between miniaturized and standard CPB circuits in aortic valve surgery.

OBJECTIVE: One of the complications of CPB is the systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS). Recent developments tend to minimize the biological impact of CPB in using miniaturized closed circuit with reduced priming volume and less blood-air interface. The benefit of these miniaturized closed circuits in terms of inflammatory response has been proved in coronary surgery. However, in open heart surgery, the CPB circuit is no more closed and the benefit of the miniaturized set-up could disappear. The aim of the study is to compare the SIRS between standard and miniaturized circuits in aortic surgery. METHODS: Forty patients who underwent singular aortic valve replacement were randomly assigned either to a standard CPB (group A, n=20) or to a miniaturized CPB (group B, n=20). Pertinent clinical and surgical data were collected. Hematological parameters (leukocyte and neutrophil counts) and biochemical parameters (C-reactive protein, cytokine tests) were determined pre-, on and post-CPB. RESULTS: There were an increase in leukocyte and neutrophil counts and a decline in hematocrit in both groups. In both groups, there was a raise after CPB, in C-reactive protein, IL-6, TNF-alpha, neutrophil elastase, and IL-10. However, the raises of elastase and TNF-alpha were significantly lower after the weaning of miniaturized CPB (116+/-46 ng/ml and 10+/-4 pg/ml, respectively) compared to standard CPB (265+/-120 ng/ml, P=0.01 and 18+/-7 pg/ml, P=0.03). The raise of IL-10 is also lower with miniaturized circuit (15+/-6 pg/ml) compared to standard circuit (51+/-26, P=0.004). CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrates in aortic surgery, the lesser inflammatory response of a miniaturized CPB compared to a standard CPB. However, there is always some inflammation after CPB and a small bio-reactive free perfusion circuit is still to be found in open heart surgery.     

Preliminary evaluation of a fuzzy logic-based automatic quantitative analysis in myocardial SPECT.

This study validates a new quantitative myocardial perfusion SPECT software. METHODS: The processing starts with the extraction of the morphologic skeleton of the left ventricular myocardium from reconstructed transverse sections. Fuzzy logic is used to decide whether a pixel belongs to the myocardium and any perfusion defect is filled according to a truncated bullet model. The resulting image is partitioned in 18 isovolumetric sectors. Sex-matched normal limits, criteria of abnormality for rest (201)Tl and (99m)Tc-labeled perfusion tracers, reproducibility studies, and detection of coronary artery disease were developed and validated in an overall population of 343 patients. The sex- and tracer-matched means and SDs of a normal response were calculated in 93 male and 93 female patients with a <5% likelihood of coronary artery disease. Reproducibility measurements and assignment of different sectors of the myocardium to a specific coronary were performed from data collected in 49 and 60 patients, respectively. The accuracy of the detection of a coronary artery occlusion was assessed in 48 patients who also underwent coronary angiography. RESULTS: The intra- and interoperator reproducibility of the sectorial activity was high with a linear regression coefficient of 0.97 and a SD of the difference measurement at 4.4% and 3.8%, respectively. Overall sensitivity and specificity for the detection of occluded coronary artery were 90% and 80%, respectively. For the detection of left anterior descending, left circumflex, and right artery coronary occlusion, sensitivity was 92%, 75%, and 92.5%, respectively, and specificity was 75%, 78%, and 90%, respectively. CONCLUSION: The new quantitative myocardial perfusion SPECT software appears to be a very helpful program for the objective analysis of perfusion tracer distribution in myocardial SPECT and a very accurate tool in the detection and localization of coronary artery occlusion.