[Myocardial inotropic function in patients with chronic obstructive lung diseases as evidenced by biventricular equilibrium ventriculography].

At present chronic obstructive lung diseases (COLD) occupy a prominent place in the morbidity and mortality of the adult population, with regarding the more and more increasing influence of aggressive environmental factors (sulfur dioxide, nitrogen, ozone, black smog and smoking). Due to the fact that clinical symptoms develop in patients with COLD at its late stages when there are irreversible changes in not only the bronchopulmonary apparatus, but, to a greater extent, the cardiovascular system; the efficiency of performed therapy is rather little. This shows it necessary to diagnose myocardial contractile disorders in such patients as soon as possible as the routine accessible cardiac study techniques (ECG, EchoCG) are of low informative value due to significant emphysema.

[Prenatal diagnosis as a method of prevention of congenital and hereditary diseases].

The program of the prevention of congenital and hereditary diseases with the aid of prenatal diagnosis includes a complex of different methods: ultrasonography, invasive procedures made at different times of pregnancy, obstetrical monitoring, immunochemical blood tests, fetal cytogenetic analysis, pathological, anatomical, and syndromological studies in abortuses. Emphasis is laid on the use of the data on ultrasound screening of the pregnant and screening of the mother's blood for some factors that form a group of women at a greater genetic risk, who require prenatal diagnosis. The efficacy of the preventive measures can be enhanced with combined use of instrumental, obstetrical and laboratory research methods.

[Prenatal diagnosis of beta-thalassemia].

Mass screening of married couples in the town of Baku has revealed a couple at risk of giving birth to a child with homozygotic beta-thalassemia. Prenatal diagnosis was carried out during week 23 of pregnancy by means of cordocentesis and biochemical analysis of globin chains, in vitro synthesized in fetal blood in the presence of labeled leucin. beta-thalassemia was detected in the fetus, similarly as in the child in this family.

[The first case of prenatal diagnosis of sickle cell anemia in the USSR].

A married couple with a risk to have a child with sickle-cell anemia has been detected as a result of mass screening of pregnant women in Baku. The prenatal diagnosis was made on the 26th week of pregnancy by means of chordocentesis and biosynthesis of globin chains that revealed the absence of normal beta-globin chain synthesis in the presence of beta S. The diagnosis of sickle-cell anemia was confirmed after abortion in the fetal blood material obtained from the heart by isoelectro-focussing.