[Giovanbattista da Monte (Montanus): father of modern clinical medicine].

The figure of Giovanbattista da Monte (1489-1551) is associated with the introduction of clinical teaching at the patient's beside, in 1543, at the San Francesco Hospital of Padua. In the XVI century, teaching was still based on the explanation and comment of the ancient authors and the educational programme was founded on theoretical aspects. The "practical" approach consisted of the treatment "ex cathedra" of diseases according to the various parts of the body, without observing the course of the pathological events with a direct confirmation at the patient's beside.

Continuous transcutaneous gas monitoring in adults on regular dialysis treatment.

We tested a transcutaneous (tc) oxygen (O2) and carbon dioxide (CO2) sensor in 15 normal adults and in 20 patients on regular dialysis treatment (RDT). We compared the tc gas values (ptcO2, PtcCO2) with the gas tension values in arterial blood samples (PaO2, PaCO2), in normal adults and in RDT-patients at the end of a 30-min test and six times during RDT. During the test, PtcO2 correlated with PaO2 both in normal adults (r 0.

Acid-base balance during biofiltration.

Five patients were shifted from acetate dialysis (AD) to biofiltration (BF); their pre-dialytic acid-base balance (ABB) was re-examined for six months before the start of BF. Samples for ABB were drawn at 0', 30', 60', 120' and 180' during three AD and 1, 2 and 3 hours after them (period A). The same procedure was then repeated two months (period B) and 12 months (period C) after the start of BF.