Do hospital employees benefit from the influenza vaccine? A placebo-controlled clinical trial.

Although current guidelines target hospital employees who contact high-risk patients as a high priority for influenza immunization, there are few data to support or refute this recommendation. Therefore, the authors enrolled 179 hospital employees in a randomized double-blind placebo-controlled clinical trial during the 1985-1986 influenza season. Influenza immunization was performed without serious adverse reactions and there was no increase in absenteeism attributable to the vaccination.

Sex-specific criteria for interpretation of thallium-201 myocardial uptake and washout studies.

A study was undertaken to determine the effect of gender on criteria for the quantitative analysis of exercise-redistribution 201Tl myocardial scintigraphy. The studies of 26 normal females and 23 normal males were subjected to bilinear interpolative background subtraction and horizontal profile analysis. Significant sexual differences were found in both regional uptake ratios and washout rates.

Prediction of death, myocardial infarction, and worsening chest pain using thallium scintigraphy and exercise electrocardiography.

Although used extensively, there is little published information on the prognostic ability of exercise 201Tl scintigraphy. Accordingly, 1 yr after testing we contacted 819 patients without previous MI or CABG seen in our laboratory during a 2-yr period. Events were defined as death from a cardiovascular cause, nonfatal MI, or worsening clinical state requiring CABG.

Variable spectrum and prognostic implications of left and right ventricular ejection fractions in patients with and without clinical heart failure after acute myocardial infarction.

To determine the spectrum and prognostic implications of left and right ventricular (LV and RV) ejection fractions (EFs) in acute myocardial infarction (AMI), radionuclide ventriculography was performed in 114 consecutive patients, admitted without (Killip class I, 78 patients) or with (killip class II, 36 patients) clinical signs of pulmonary congestion within 24 hours of onset of symptoms of a transmural AMI. Mean LVEF was significantly lower in patients in Killip class II than in those in class I (0.32 +/- 0.

Extent and severity of myocardial hypoperfusion as predictors of prognosis in patients with suspected coronary artery disease.

The ability of exercise-induced myocardial hypoperfusion on thallium scintigraphy to predict coronary events was assessed in 1,689 patients with symptoms suggestive of coronary artery disease but without prior myocardial infarction or coronary artery bypass surgery. A total of 74 patients had a coronary event in the year after testing (12 cardiac deaths, 20 nonfatal infarctions and 42 referrals for bypass surgery more than 60 days after testing). Stepwise logistic regression identified only three independent predictors: the number of myocardial regions with reversible hypoperfusion (an index of the extent of hypoperfusion), the maximal magnitude of hypoperfusion (an index of the severity of hypoperfusion) and the achieved heart rate (an index of exercise performance).