Captopril may reduce biochemical (prostate-specific antigen) failure following radical prostatectomy for clinically localized prostate cancer.

Objective: A prior report suggested that individuals medicated with captopril showed a decreased incidence of prostate cancer. This study therefore investigated whether captopril given postoperatively had any preventive effect on biochemical recurrence for patients treated with radical prostatectomy.

Material And Methods: Data were prospectively reviewed for 62 men subjected to radical retropubic prostatectomy due to biopsy-confirmed, clinically localized prostate cancer and comparisons were made between two groups, those receiving captopril postoperatively (12.

Association between captopril, other antihypertensive drugs and risk of prostate cancer.

Background: There has been some debate on the existence of an association between hypertension, antihypertensive medications and cancer risk.

Methods: We performed a nested case-control study to assess the association between the risk of prostate cancer and the use of the angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE)-inhibitor captopril, and other antihypertensive drugs. We used data from the General Practice Research Database in UK.

Alteration of the fibrinogen molecule and its phosphorylation state in myocardial infarction patients undergoing thrombolytic treatment.

Fibrinogen was purified by protamine-agarose chromatography from plasma from three patients after their submission to hospital due to acute myocardial infarction. The total amount of phosphate bound to fibrinogen and the concentration of fibrinogen was determined in samples withdrawn immediately after submission and after thrombolytic treatment. Streptokinase treatment almost totally removed circulating fibrinogen while recombinant tissue plasminogen activator spared much of it.

[Brain damage caused by hypotensive anesthesia? Both the anesthetic technique and the anesthetic agent must be chosen with care].

During the fifty years since hypotensive anaesthesia, induced hypotension to minimise intraoperative blood loss, became an established routine, there have been few reports of associated cerebral complications. However, evidence of disturbed cerebral function among patients undergoing orthognathic surgery under induced hypotension was obtained in a recent study where the level of adenylate kinase activity in cerebrospinal fluid was used as a highly sensitive biochemical marker of brain cell injury. Moreover, psychometric tests revealed persistent postoperative mental deterioration.

Erythrocytic protein kinase C activity in primary hypertension.

Objectives: Increased protein kinase C activity has been reported in erythrocytes from patients with primary hypertension and also from hypertensive rats. In this phenomenological study, we investigated whether a possible increased activity was the result of an augmented amount of enzyme molecules or a more active enzyme.

Design: Collect blood samples, separate erythrocytes from other blood cells.

Disturbed energy balance in skeletal muscle of patients with untreated primary hypertension.

Objective: It has been shown that the distribution of Na+ and Ca2+ in various cells is abnormal in patients with untreated primary hypertension, indicating an altered membrane permeability in these cells. This would activate certain ion pumps and thereby enhance ATP turnover. We investigated possible alterations in energy economy of skeletal muscle tissue.

Direct effect of insulin on 45calcium uptake in human erythrocytes.

Objective: High blood pressure is prevalent in obesity and non-insulin dependent diabetes mellitus; both conditions, with insulin resistance and essential hypertension, have been associated with increasing intra-erythrocytic levels of calcium ions. We tested the hypothesis of whether insulin itself might be responsible for the abnormal red cell cytosolic free calcium.

Design: The ionic effects of insulin were studied on the kinetics of 45calcium uptake in vitro in normal human erythrocytes.

Treatment of renal anaemia with recombinant human erythropoietin results in decreased red cell uptake of 45Ca.

The ability of erythrocytes to undergo deformation may be of importance to erythrocyte survival and to blood flow resistance. In a previous study a decreased deformability was demonstrated in the erythrocytes of uraemic patients treated with recombinant human erythropoietin (rhEPO). Erythrocyte deformability is, at least partly, determined by the intracellular concentration of free calcium ions.

Decreased erythrocyte cholesterol/phospholipid ratio in untreated patients with essential hypertension.

The erythrocyte cholesterol/phospholipid ratio was determined in eight patients with untreated essential hypertension and compared with that of eight age-matched control subjects. The ratio was significantly lower in patients (Wilcoxon's paired rank test; P less than 0.01), and a correlation existed between the ratio and serum cholesterol concentration in patients (r = 0.

Inhibition of Zn(2+)-dependent ATPase in prostasome membrane by nonsaturated, long-chain fatty acids.

Arachidonic and oleic acids, opposite to stearic and palmitic acids, at concentrations near 10(-5) mol/l markedly inhibited Zn(2+)-dependent ATPase in human prostasome membranes. Arachidonic acid was somewhat more potent as inhibitor than oleic acid and the involvement of the metabolites of arachidonic acid cascade was less probable. Deoxycholate, an anionic biological detergent, produced a similar inhibitory effect although at a much higher concentration.

Antianginal and anti-ischemic efficacy of nicorandil compared with nifedipine in patients with angina pectoris and coronary heart disease: a double-blind, randomized, multicenter study.

Patients with stable, effort-induced angina pectoris and a typical combination of anginal pain and ischemic ST depression in exercise tolerance tests were randomized to treatment for 8 weeks with nicorandil (a newly developed antianginal and anti-ischemic drug) or nifedipine. After 4 weeks, the dosage of nicorandil was increased from 10 mg b.i.

Phospholipase A activity in seminal plasma of men attending an infertility clinic.

Seminal plasma from 40 men attending an infertility clinic was analyzed for phospholipase A activity and compared with serum from 20 healthy blood donors. The imprecision of the method was acceptable and the overall coefficient of variation was 8.1%.

Increased whole blood viscosity combined with decreased erythrocyte fluidity in untreated patients with essential hypertension.

Erythrocyte fluidity and other haemorheological variables were studied in 22 patients with essential hypertension and compared with age- and sex-matched healthy controls. Hypertensive patients displayed a significantly lower erythrocyte fluidity (P less than 0.001).

Improved blood pressure control with isradipine in hypertensive patients treated with pindolol.

Isradipine is a new calcium antagonist of the dihydropyridine type with marked vasodilator activity and minimal negative inotropic effects. It is a potent antihypertensive drug when given as monotherapy. This was a randomized double-blind crossover study of 16 weeks' duration, including 80 hypertensive patients with diastolic blood pressures of at least 95 mm Hg who had shown clinically relevant antihypertensive responses, but no normalization of blood pressure during pindolol 10 to 15 mg once daily as monotherapy.

Effect of pindolol on changes in serum lipids induced by hydrochlorthiazide.

Forty-two patients with essential hypertension, WHO I-II, and a diastolic blood pressure greater than or equal to 100 mm Hg, were initially given 25 mg hydrochlorthiazide alone. After treatment for 3 months 10 mg pindolol was also given to 16 of them as the diastolic blood pressure had not been reduced to less than or equal to 90 mm Hg. After 3 months treatment on hydrochlorthiazide alone there was a significant increase in serum cholesterol, low density lipoprotein cholesterol and triglyceride concentrations, and a decrease in high density lipoprotein cholesterol concentration, and this pattern persisted after a further 3 months on the single drug regimen.

Reversible brain cell damage due to hypoglycemia in a patient with insulinoma.

A case of an insulinoma with hypoglycemic attacks accompanied by episodes of unconsciousness in a 57-year-old woman is described. During the hypoglycemic spells the level of adenylate kinase (AK) in the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) was elevated 6-fold above the normalized level obtained later from the patient being in a normoglycemic condition. CSF-AK was previously found to be a sensitive marker of subtle brain cell damage due to hypoxia.

Decreased 45calcium uptake in red cells of patients with essential hypertension.

Decreased 45calcium uptake was observed in red cells of 20 patients with essential hypertension. Equilibration of extracellular 45calcium with intracellular calcium was not achieved within 60 min in red cells of either hypertensive patients or control subjects. By introducing the ionophore A23187, equilibrium conditions were attained for red cells of both categories of individuals.

Prostasome membrane associated enzyme activities and semen parameters in men attending an infertility clinic.

Seminal plasma from 22 men attending an infertility clinic was subjected to preparative ultracentrifugation for 2 h at 105,000 g. The pelleted material as well as the supernatant thus obtained were investigated with regard to prostasome membrane-linked enzyme activities in relation to other semen parameters. The mean activity of Zn2+-dependent adenosine triphosphatase in the sedimented prostasome fraction was 1.

Efficacy and safety of bisoprolol and atenolol in patients with mild to moderate hypertension: a double-blind, parallel group international multicentre study.

Three hundred and fifteen patients were randomly allocated to treatment for six months with bisoprolol 5 or 10 mg day-1 or atenolol, 50 mg day-1, in a double-blind, double-dummy parallel group, international multicentre study. Two hundred and ninety-two (175 men and 117 women) were eligible for statistical follow-up. Their mean age was 52.