Toxic epidermal necrolysis; 15 years'' experience in a Dutch burns centre

BACKGROUND: Toxic epidermal necrolysis (TEN) is a severe and potentially fatal drug reaction characterized by an extensive skin rash with blisters and exfoliation, frequently accompanied by mucositis. The wounds caused by TEN are similar to second-degree burns and severe cases may involve large areas of skin loss. OBJECTIVES: Analysis of our results in patients with TEN and evaluation of the variety of therapeutic interventions that has been studied and suggested in TEN. PATIENTS/METHODS: Retrospective analysis of 19 consecutive patients with TEN treated in our burns centre between 1989 and 2004. RESULTS: Immediate withdrawal of any potentially fatal drug, maximum supportive care, and a restricted and tailored antibiotic, medical and surgical treatment regimen confined mortality to 21%, whereas prognosis scores like APACHE II and SCORTEN predicted mortality of 22 and 30%, respectively. A positive contribution of selective digestive decontamination is suggested but has yet to be established. CONCLUSIONS: Because of a potentially fatal outcome, fast referral of a patient suspected of TEN to a specialized centre (mostly a burns unit or specialized dermatology centre) for expert wound management and tailored comprehensive care is strongly advised and contributes to survival.     

Experience of a combined apheresis, blood collection, and blood transfusion unit in a large tertiary care medical center

The Barnes Hospital Apheresis Blood Collection and Blood Transfusion Unit is part of Barns Hospital Blood Bank. Because of its size and complexity, we report our experience which may be useful to administrators and physicians involved in the planning or management of similar services. From 1985 through 1988 we collected platelets from 1,976 different donors, the majority of which (87%) were community donors. Sixty-nine percent of 1,976 donors donated in 1988 an average of 4.9 times. Of 6,568 apheresis products collected. 1.1% were discarded because of positive screening tests and 0.7% were discarded because of outdating or presence of fibrin clot. In 1988 a total of nine cell separators were used. All donor apheresis were done with seven blood separators, and on average a separator produced an apheresis product every 4.5 worked hours. All therapeutic apheresis (338) were done on two separators. Most of them (88%) were performed during work hours. In 1988 donor and therapeutic apheresis were done by 17 1/2 full-time employees (FTEs) during work hours. Considering the Workload Unit Value per procedure given by the College of American Pathologists (CAP) and that each FTE worked 1,864 hours per year, the worked hour productivity for donor and therapeutic apheresis was 78.2%. Blood collections, therapeutic bleeds, and outpatient transfusions (1,127, 114 and 1,745 respectively) were accomplished by two FTEs, for a worked hour productivity of 35.5%. Because 95.1% of total worked units was produced by efficient donor and therapeutic apheresis activities, overall efficiency remained high at 73.8%.     

清代名医的医德（二）

用生动事例介绍清代名医的医德，以供后人效法和学习。     

Medical management of Crohn's disease: A guide for radiologists

The choice of therapies for Crohn's disease has expanded greatly over the past 30 years. Increasingly it is important that we attempt to identify subgroups of patients who will benefit most from each type of therapy. This article reviews the therapeutic options currently available, organized by the goal the practitioner hopes to achieve. Imaging is one critical way of aiding the classification of Crohn's disease by attempting to accurately determine the location, extent and, most importantly, the nature of the disease.     

When the standards aren't standard: Evidence-based medicine in the Russian context

This paper examines the uses of evidence-based medicine (EBM) in post-Soviet Russia through the use of semi-structured interviews. It asks what it means to talk about practicing evidence-based medicine in a setting where the context of practice presents considerable barriers to the implementation of EBM principles. Drawing on interviews with Russian physicians, medical students and users of the healthcare system, the paper argues that in post-Soviet Russia EBM serves as a strategic discourse for segments of the medical profession. With the collapse of the U.S.S.R. the healthcare system has been going through a period of crisis, and Russian physicians are finding that they have to redefine their professional identity with respect to the domestic and the international context and have to seek new sources for legitimating their professional position. The western origins of EBM endow this rhetoric with considerable power in the Russian context and render it a very useful tool in the project of redefinition.     

Time and cost involved in the care of newly registered patients with diabetes mellitus and other lifestyle diseases at diabetes clinics in Japan (JDDM 4).

AIMS: To study the time and cost involved in the care of newly registered outpatients with Type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM), compared with patients with hypertension and/or hyperlipidaemia (HTL). METHODS: A total of 313 patients with DM and 58 patients with HTL without diabetes were registered on their first visits to 11 diabetes clinics across Japan. The time and cost involved in their care was recorded over the following 5 months. RESULTS: In the first 3 months, there was an extensive time commitment to both groups. The time spent by physicians was 1.5 times longer for DM than for HTL. The total care time spent by all the care providers for DM was twice that for HTL. The cost of DM care was twice that for HTL, with the cost of medicines excluded. However, half of the cost for DM was for laboratory tests. When these were excluded, and the remaining cost divided by the time spent, the amount for DM was half of that for HTL. Over the 5 months, mean glycated haemoglobin (HbA(1c)) in DM patients improved from 8.0% to 6.5%, and 72% of DM patients achieved the glycaemic target of HbA(1c) < or = 6.5%. CONCLUSIONS: DM care in a diabetes clinic requires a great deal more time and resources than HTL to achieve the best outcome. An educational system for self care, presently lacking in the primary care setting in Japan, would improve glycaemic control for DM patients in the community.     

Autonomy and modernisation: the management of change in an English primary care trust

Recent New Labour policy for the ‘modernisation’ of Government places a good deal of emphasis on decentralisation. This emphasis is particularly marked in relation to the organisation of primary care. However, like hospitals and other National Health Service institutions, primary care trusts (PCTs) are subject to a substantial raft of centrally established performance targets and indicators, including those which contribute to the public award of between zero and three performance ‘stars’. This raises questions about the extent to which employees can exercise autonomy in the context of rigid top‐down directives. This paper presents findings from a study using participant observation and interviews to examine the impact of a training course aimed ostensibly at increasing employee autonomy in an English PCT. The suggestion is that attempts to make employees more autonomous can be seen as a strategy for increasing central control based upon the internalisation by the employees of centrally promulgated values. The attraction of such strategies is that they may be potentially more effective and less costly than alternative strategies of direct control. However, the study suggests that the outcome of attempts by such methods as programmes to increase employee autonomy may be very different from those intended.     

The Application of Number Needed to Treat (NNT) to Clinical Problems in Radiotherapy

The goals of this report are: 1) to review the number needed to treat (NNT) concept, which, although well established in many sectors of medicine, is still relatively new to the radiotherapy community; 2) to discuss several clinical radiotherapy examples illustrating the inherent advantages of the NNT approach; and 3) to discuss potential future roles of the NNT concept within radiotherapy.     

Report from the 1st Japanese Urological Association-Japanese Society of Medical Oncology joint conference, 2006: ''A step towards better collaboration between urologists and medical oncologists''

The 1st Japanese Urological Association-Japanese Society of Medical Oncology Joint Conference, titled 'A step towards better collaboration between urologists and medical oncologists', was held to coincide with the 44th Meeting of the Japan Society of Clinical Oncology, Tokyo, in October 2006. The main theme of the conference addressed the need for a subspecialty of medical oncologist within urology to keep abreast of advances in medical oncology. Urologists should become more involved in the postoperative management of urologic cancer. Consensus on the optimal way to move forward in the treatment of urological cancer is needed. The conference featured eight lectures surveying the present status of uro-oncology in Europe, the USA, Korea, Singapore, and Japan; the relationship between surgical oncologists and medical oncologists; global trends and international clinical trials in uro-oncology; and the future of urologic oncology. These were followed by a general discussion titled 'Achieving better collaboration between the surgical oncologist and the medical oncologist.' This report presents a roundup of the 1st Japanese Urological Association-Japanese Society of Medical Oncology Joint Conference.     

Tubal patency and fertility outcome after expectant management of ectopic pregnancy

Objective: To study tubal patency and fertility outcome of patients with expectantly managed ectopic pregnancy (EP).

Design: A prospective study.

Setting: Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Turku University Central Hospital, Turku, Finland.

Patient(s): Thirty patients who wanted to become pregnant again were treated successfully by expectant management of EP.

Intervention(s): Patients were examined with posttreatment hysterosalpingography, and they filled out a questionnaire about their subsequent pregnancies.

Main Outcome Measure(s): Free passage through open lumen showing tubal patency; number of full-term pregnancies and EPs revealing relative rate of subsequent fertility.

Result(s): A free passage through the diseased tube was seen in 93% of the cases (28 of 30). Two of the 24 patients (8.4%) who wanted to become pregnant had an obstruction in the diseased tube. One (4.2%) of them had a normal opposite tube and later had a normal pregnancy. The other (4.2%) had an obstruction in both tubes and subsequently had a repeat EP. One of the 6 patients had an EP (this patient did not want to become pregnant and did not use contraception). However, her posttreatment hysterosalpingography was normal. In total, the subsequent pregnancy rate was 88% (21 of 24), and the rate of repeat EP was 4.2% (1 of 24).

Conclusion(s): Patients who are treated with expectant management have a good long-term fertility outcome. Spontaneous regression of EP does not lead to increased harm or damage to the tube, i.e., the risk for repeat EP is low.