[Coronary angioplasty during the acute phase of myocardial infarction in the aged subject].

Myocardial infarction is a common and serious condition in patients over 70 years of age. The aim of this study was to assess the feasibility and efficacy of angioplasty without thrombolysis for revascularising an occluded artery in this age group. Between March 1986 and December 1989, 32 patients over 70 years of age (average 76 +/- 3 years) underwent angioplasty without thrombolysis in the acute phase of myocardial infarction.

Influence of the rt-PA dose (1 mg/kg versus 1.5 mg/kg) and duration of administration on the patency of infarct-related coronary arteries in 81 patients.

This open study compared the efficacy and side effects of two dose regimens of intravenous rt-PA initiated before the fifth hour after the onset of myocardial infarction. The first 40 patients (group A) received 1 mg/kg of rt-PA infused over 90 minutes, including a 10-mg initial bolus. The following 41 patients (group B) received 1.

[How to evaluate the cost/effectiveness ratio of different therapies of coronary disease].

The results of epidemiologic studies on the efficacy of different strategies of prevention or improvement of the prognosis of coronary artery disease are generally expressed in terms of percentage reduction of risk; for example, the treatment of hypercholesterolaemia reduces the risk of coronary death by 21%. In order to improve the assessment of the efficacy of these approaches the authors propose to take into account the number of subjects which needs to be treated each year to prevent one cardiovascular event more than the control group (for example, in hypercholesterolaemia, 1,736 patients). This number depends on the reduction of risk and also on the incidence of complications in the control group.

[Ventricular arrhythmias disclosing myocardial abscess in infectious mitro-aortic endocarditis].

The authors report the case of a myocardial abscess in an infectious endocarditis with a double localization, mitral and aortic. The way it is revealed, by severe and recurring ventricular arrhythmias, differs from the conduction disorders usually described. The diagnosis is suspected by non-invasive examinations, echocardiography and nuclear magnetic resonance.

[A rare cause of acute circulatory failure with pulmonary edema: catecholergic cardiomyopathy of pheochromocytoma].

We report the case of a 37 years old woman with pheochromocytoma of the adrenal gland, with acute circulatory failure and pulmonary oedema. Its originality lies, besides the rare circumstances of diagnosis, in the echographic aspect of the left ventricle with an apical myocardial infarction with both severe apical hypokinesia and compensating basal hyperkinesia. In the literature the most frequent aspect of catecholamine cardiomyopathy is a large uniform dilatation of the left ventricle with often wall hypertrophy.

[Two-dimensional echocardiography during the acute phase of myocardial infarction. Diagnostic and prognostic value].

A bidimensional cardiac sonogram was performed in 152 consecutive patients with in 24 hours after hospitalization in the intensive care unit for acute myocardial infarction, in order to evaluate the contribution of this technique to the diagnosis, determination of early complication and the prognosis. For this study, the left ventricle was divided in 10.segments.