California v. Texas: Avoiding an Antidemocratic Outcome.

The Affordable Care Act ("ACA") contains a section titled "Requirement to Maintain Essential Minimum Coverage." Colloquially known as the Individual Mandate, this section of the Act initially established a monetary penalty for anyone who did not maintain health insurance in a given tax year. But with the passage of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, the monetary penalty was reset to zero, inducing opponents of the ACA to mount a legal challenge over the Individual Mandate's constitutionality.

Timing of surgical repair and resource utilisation in infants with complete atrioventricular septal defect.

Introduction: Variation exists in the timing of surgery for balanced complete atrioventricular septal defect repair. We sought to explore associations between timing of repair and resource utilisation and clinical outcomes in the first year of life.

Methods: In this retrospective single-centre cohort study, we included patients who underwent complete atrioventricular septal defect repair between 2005 and 2019.

Asphyxiation due to dry ice in a walk-in freezer.

Background: Exposure to a high concentration of environmental carbon dioxide (CO2) can result in poisoning through direct toxicity and by displacing atmospheric oxygen (O2). Dry ice undergoes sublimation to a gaseous state at -78.5 degrees C (-109.

Feasibility and utility of three-dimensional color flow echocardiography of the aortic arch: The "echocardiographic angiogram".

Two-dimensional transthoracic echocardiography (2DE) is the most commonly used diagnostic modality to evaluate congenital and acquired abnormalities of the aortic arch. However, 2DE is frequently limited in this ability due to the three-dimensional character of the arch and its interrelationships with other vascular structures. Recently, three-dimensional echocardiography (3DE) with 3D color flow Doppler became commercially available.

Right ventricular outflow tract stent as a bridge to surgery in a premature infant with tetralogy of Fallot.

Despite dramatic progress in neonatal cardiac surgery, prematurity and low birth weight remain risk factors for poor outcome. Attempts to delay intervention with supportive therapy have been shown to increase morbidity and mortality. We present a case of an 840 gram, 28-week gestation newborn with tetralogy of Fallot, in whom palliation was achieved with a right ventricular outflow tract stent.

Characteristics of the interatrial communication in patients undergoing transcatheter device closure of atrial septal defects for cryptogenic stroke.

Background: Prior studies suggest that patent foramen ovale (PFO) diameter >4 mm is associated with a high probability of cryptogenic ischemic stroke (CIS).

Methods: We evaluated all patients diagnosed with CIS who underwent closure of intra-atrial communication (IAC) using the Amplatzer atrial septal defect (ASD) occluder in our institution between August 1997 and March 2004. For each IAC, echocardiographic diameters and balloon-stretched diameters were recorded.