Symptom relief and health-related quality of life in globus patients: a prospective study.

Globus may be a persistent symptom impairing patients' quality of life. Diagnostics and treatment are controversial but some globus patients may benefit from reassurance and attention. We investigated how globus symptoms change during a short-term follow-up without any treatment after an examination by an ear, nose and throat (ENT) physician and further diagnostic procedures.

Stability of an epidural analgesic admixture of levobupivacaine, fentanyl and epinephrine.

What Is Known And Objective: Admixtures of levobupivacaine, fentanyl and epinephrine are increasingly used in epidural pain management. Neither the compatibility nor the stability of levobupivacaine with fentanyl and epinephrine is known and therefore we examined the chemical, physical and microbiological stability of levobupivacaine-fentanyl-epinephrine and levobupivacaine-fentanyl admixtures prepared in the hospital pharmacy.

Methods: Fentanyl and epinephrine were added into commercial levobupivacaine infusion bags.

Imprecision of cardiac marker analyses among laboratories on the basis of external quality assurance results: Finnish experience.

The purpose of this report was to evaluate the reproducibility and harmonization of cardiac marker tests and to describe the current situation concerning quality of assays for cardiac markers on the basis of the results of the external quality control schemes (EQAS) of Labquality Ltd., Helsinki, Finland in the period 2002 to 2005. Finnish EQAS surveys obtained for proficiency samples at low marker concentration indicated that the overall coefficient of variation (CV) between laboratories for CK-MBmass and troponin I exceeded 10 %, while for cardiac troponin T the CV was 8.

Respiratory syncytial virus infection in children hospitalized for wheezing: virus-specific studies from infancy to preschool years.

Aim: To evaluate whether the presence of immunoglobulin G (IgG) antibodies against respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) in early childhood is associated with later asthma, and to evaluate a new diagnostic test for RSV, reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR), comparing it to the antigen and antibody assays initially used in RSV diagnostics in the present cohort.

Methods: At the start of the study in 1992-1993, RSV was studied by antigen detection (using time-resolved fluoroimmunoassay) and complement-fixing antibody assay. Advances in methodology allowed us to supplement RSV studies by RT-PCR in frozen nasopharyngeal aspirates obtained on admission, and by specific IgG antibodies (using enzyme immunoassay) in frozen serum samples obtained during the follow-up.