Early detection and prediction of cardiotoxicity after radiation therapy for breast cancer: the BACCARAT prospective cohort study.

Background: Radiotherapy (RT) for breast cancer presents a benefit in terms of reducing local recurrence and deaths resulting from breast cancer but it can lead to secondary effects due to the presence of neighboring cardiac normal tissues within the irradiation field. Breast RT has been shown to be associated with long-term increased risk of heart failure, coronary artery disease, myocardial infarction and finally cardiovascular death more than 10 years after RT. However, there is still a lack of knowledge for early cardiotoxicity induced by breast RT that can appear long before the onset of clinically significant cardiac events.

Apparatus to measure adsorption of condensable solvents on technical surfaces by photothermal deflection.

This article describes an instrument for the measurement of the mirage effect as a tool to determine the molar adsorption per unit surface area Y(1) of condensable solvents in the presence of a non-condensable carrier gas. The present apparatus is a much improved version of previous prototypes developed in our laboratory and elsewhere with a higher surface bake-out temperature (150 °C rather than 40 °C), lower residual vacuum (3 Pa versus 100 Pa), greater sample surface (40 mm diameter instead of 10 mm), more powerful optical pump beam (150 W cf. 50 W), and larger saturated vapour preparation volume (4 L instead of 1 L).

Diagnostic performance of complete lower limb venous ultrasound in patients with clinically suspected acute pulmonary embolism.

A limited ultrasound (US) confined to the popliteal and femoral veins is usually performed to detect deep vein thrombosis (DVT) in patients with clinically suspected acute pulmonary embolism (PE). Our objective was to assess the diagnostic accuracy of complete lower limb US examining both the proximal and distal veins in this setting. In this prospective study, 210 consecutive patients were included.

Imaging of retroperitoneal ganglioneuroma.

The aim of this study was to describe the radiological appearance of retroperitoneal ganglioneuroma. We retrospectively reviewed seven cases of histologically proven retroperitoneal ganglioneuroma. Ultrasound and enhanced CT were obtained in all cases, and MRI in three cases.