Recurrent late cardiac tamponade following cardiac surgery: a deceiving and potentially lethal complication.

Background: Cardiac tamponade, characterized by inflow obstruction of the heart chambers by extracardiac compression, is a potentially lethal complication following cardiac surgery.

Case Report: We present a case of recurrent cardiac tamponade following valve surgery. At first presentation, diagnosis was delayed because of atypical symptoms and the absence of accumulated pericardial fluid on the transthoracic echocardiogram.

Intravenous leiomyomatosis: report of two cases and strategy for surgical resection.

Intravenous leiomyomatosis is a rare smooth muscle tumour that arises from the myometrium and grows into the extrauterine venous system. It typically can extend into the vena cava inferior and even the cardiac chambers. This can lead to life threatening obstruction of cardiac valves.

[Papillary fibroelastoma: a rare cause of brain embolism].

A 39-year-old woman presented with weakness in the right arm and leg, and a 64-year-old woman was referred after a transient ischaemic attack. Neurological examination raised the suspicion of cerebral ischaemia due to an embolism. In both patients transthoracic echocardiography was performed to rule out the heart as a source of emboli.

No cytogenetic evidence for involvement of gene(s) at 2p16 in sporadic cardiac myxomas: cytogenetic changes in ten sporadic cardiac myxomas.

Cardiac myxomas are significant causes of cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. Their genetic background is presently unknown. Recently, linkage analysis in cardiac myxomas of Carney complex patients has indicated that 2p16 and 17q2 might carry genes responsible for the development of hereditary cardiac myxomas.

Preoperative staging of non-small-cell lung cancer with positron-emission tomography.

Background: Determining the stage of non-small-cell lung cancer often requires multiple preoperative tests and invasive procedures. Whole-body positron-emission tomography (PET) may simplify and improve the evaluation of patients with this tumor.

Methods: We prospectively compared the ability of a standard approach to staging (computed tomography [CT], ultrasonography, bone scanning, and, when indicated, needle biopsies) and one involving PET to detect metastases in mediastinal lymph nodes and at distant sites in 102 patients with resectable non-small-cell lung cancer.