Colonoscopic findings in patients with lower gastrointestinal bleeding send to a hospital for their study. Value of clinical data in predicting normal or pathological findings.

Background: Lower gastrointestinal bleeding is a highly frequent clinical problem that may reflect serious pathology in the colon. Colonoscopy is generally accepted as the diagnostic procedure of choice. Decisions as to whether to carry out colonoscopy or not, are not well defined.

Epidemiology of hepatitis D virus infection: changes in the last 14 years.

To calculate the prevalence of hepatitis D virus (HDV) superinfection, antibody to HDV (anti-HD) was tested on admission in 696 hepatitis B virus (HBV) chronic carriers diagnosed between 1979 and 1992. Anti-HD was positive in 67 patients (9.6%), and it was more frequently detected in i.

Tuberculous peritonitis: diagnostic value of ascitic fluid pH and lactate.

Background: The analytical pattern of ascitic fluid in peritoneal tuberculosis is frequently similar to that found in other causes of ascites. The diagnostic value of the ascitic fluid pH and lactate in cases of tuberculous peritonitis has not yet been established.

Methods: Ascitic fluid pH, lactate, total proteins, cell count, lactate dehydrogenase, glucose, and their blood-ascitic gradients were determined in 10 patients with tuberculous peritonitis (group I).

Epidemiological, clinical and biological characteristics of acute non-A, non-B hepatitis with and without hepatitis C virus infection.

Serially collected serum samples from 81 patients with acute non-A, non-B hepatitis were tested for the presence of antibodies to hepatitis C virus (anti-HCV) by a second-generation enzyme immunoassay (EIA) test. Anti-HCV was detected in 56 cases (69%) during the first month, in 61 cases (75%) at 3 months and in 63 cases (78%) at 6 months. In those 18 patients showing anti-HCV negative results in the three determinations, hepatitis C virus (HCV) RNA was tested using a nested polymerase chain reaction (PCR) in the first serum sample and was detected in only one case.

[Blood donors with positive HBsAg in Asturias: its current prevalence and significance].

Background: The aim of the present study was to know the current prevalence of HBsAg positivity in Asturias blood donors and to carry out a clinical study of the carriers of the hepatitis B virus (HBV) accidentally detected in a blood donation program.

Methods: A prospective study of incidence and prevalence of HBsAg positivity in blood donations performed in Asturias over two years from October 1989 and 1991 was carried out and the epidemiologic, clinical, and analytical characteristics, as well as histologic liver lesions in the HBsAg positive cases were determined.

Results: Among the 42,789 blood donors during this above mentioned period in Asturias 119 cases of HBsAg positivity were found, representing a prevalence of 0.

[The accidental detection of anti-HCV positivity and monoclonal gammapathy].

The study presents four cases of monoclonal gammopathy accidentally detected in anti-HCV-positive blood donors without previously known hepatopathy. A hematological and hepatic studies were performed, including liver biopsy in all the cases, discussing the implications of the association between the two phenomena and the possible false positives of anti-HCV in hypergammaglobulinemias.

[A ventriculoperitoneal shunt as a rare cause of ascites].

We report the case of a 22-year-old man with a craniopharyngioma, who developed ascites following a ventriculoperitoneal shunt procedure for hydrocephalus. The ascites was resolved with diversion of the distal catheter into the right atrium. A ventriculoperitoneal shunt can cause ascites, even without neurological symptoms suggestive of shunt malfunction.

[Mixed type-II cryoglobulinemia associated with a chronic hepatitis C virus infection].

We describe the case of a patient with non A-non B post-transfusional cirrhosis and type-II mixed cryoglobulinemia, who showed in relation with said processes several acute symptoms of vasculitis, polyarthritis, pericarditis and autoimmune hemolytic anemia, finally dying due to an advanced hepatocellular insufficiency. In this patient the determination of antibodies against hepatitis C virus (anti-HCV) was positive, that is why we assume a possible relationship between both processes and the first literature references, after the clonation of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) genome, are reviewed.

Hepatitis C virus infection in patients with acute hepatitis B.

The prevalence of antibodies to hepatitis C virus (anti-HCV) was studied using a second-generation ELISA test in 121 patients with self-limiting acute hepatitis B, including 63 intravenous drug addicts (IVDA). Within the first month after the onset of illness, 47.1% of the patients were anti-HCV positive, this figure reaching 52.