[Visceral leishmaniasis in immunocompromised patients].

Objective: Most patients who developed visceral leishmaniasis (VL) in our country are ímmunocompromised (IC) host, frequently HIV-infected patients. One objective was to know if there were differences about the clinical manifestations, diagnostic tests or prognosis in IC patients who were infected or not with HIV (HIV+ and HIV-, respectively). Also we wonder if some features were associated with death during the initial episodes of VL.

[Outbreak of nosocomial diarrhea by Clostridium difficile in a department of internal medicine].

Background: Clostridium difficile (DCD) is the main etiologic agent of nosocomial diarrhea of infectious origin. Most of the cases of DCD have been detected in a hospital environment.

Patients, Material And Methods: From October to November 1996 five cases of nosocomial diarrhea were detected with the presence of the toxin A of Clostridium difficile being observed in the stools.

[Detection of cognitive deterioration in elderly patients attending an emergency hospital service].

Background: An increasing proportion of patients attended at hospital emergence departments (HED) are elderly people.

Objectives: a) To check the reliability of the usual medical assessment to detect the cognitive deterioration in elderly people attended at HED, compared with that performed systematically by means of an evaluation test of cognitive functions; b) to study the applicability of such a test in HED, on the basis of the time necessary for its administration, and c) to describe the deterioration prevalence in that group of patients and identify the possible associated risks for its detection in patients.

Patients And Methods: Prospective study including patients aged > or = 60 years attended at a HED, using the orientation, memory and concentration test (OMC) to perform the cognitive assessment.

[Pyogenic liver abscess. A descriptive study of 35 cases].

Thirty-five patients with pyogenic hepatic abscess (PHA) attended over 13 years in a general hospital were studied. The aim of the study was to know the usefulness of the performance of opaque enema in patients with cryptogenic PHA and the prognosis of the patients treated with only antibiotics. The most frequent clinical and analytical manifestations were fever and leukocytosis.