Cisplatin-induced hyperglycemic hyperosmolar coma.

We present a case of severe hyperglycaemic hyperosmolar derangement after treatment with cisplatin in a patient without previous diabetes mellitus. Limited data are available on this adverse reaction, explaining why impaired glucose handling due to cisplatin is not generally recognised.

[An unusual cause of meningo-encephalitis: Japanese encephalitis].

Two women, 29 and 30 years of age, who had visited Indonesia and Thailand, respectively, during the summer, presented with diarrhoea, headache, fever and later neurological symptoms. The first patient had to be sedated because of restlessness and was admitted to the intensive-care unit for intravenous antimicrobial therapy; the second became comatose and received intravenous rehydration and antipyretics. No diagnosis was made during the acute phase ofthe illness, but later there was serological evidence of Japanese encephalitis.

Lung mechanical profiles in acute respiratory failure: diagnostic and prognostic value of compliance at different tidal volumes.

The mean airway pressure difference within a respiratory cycle at end-inspiration was measured at different tidal volumes (VT) in 59 patients treated with mechanical ventilation, and plotted in a pressure-volume (P-V) diagram. Regression analysis revealed three types of regression lines which were clearly correlated with clinical pulmonary condition and outcome. The slope of such regression lines may be a more realistic representation of lung elasticity than conventional total static compliance, which is measured at only one VT, and the intercept of these lines may be a more appropriate reflection of operating lung volume than functional residual capacity.

Mechanical ventilation for acute postoperative respiratory failure after surgery for bronchial carcinoma.

From 1978 to 1982 365 patients were treated surgically for bronchial carcinoma. Lobectomy was performed in 250 and pneumonectomy in 115. Sixteen (4.

Central venous versus esophageal pressure changes for calculation of lung compliance during mechanical ventilation.

Esophageal and CVP changes were measured simultaneously during mechanical ventilation in 12 patients with acute respiratory failure (ARF). The results of these measurements were different and showed no correlation. Values of transpulmonary pressure changes and calculated lung compliances correlated well, because of the higher airway pressure changes.