Prevalence of Congenital Heart Disease and Pulmonary Hypertension in Down's Syndrome: An Echocardiographic Study.

Background: Down's syndrome (DS) is a genetic anomaly, which undergoes increased morbidity and mortality when associated with congenital heart disease (CHD). The aims of the study were to determine the prevalence of CHD and pulmonary hypertension (PH) in DS.

Methods: One hundred twenty-seven patients with DS living in Mexico City were evaluated by physical exam, electrocardiogram and echocardiogram.

Left atrial cardiac myxoma. Two unusual cases studied by 3D echocardiography.

We describe two patients with cardiac tumors in the left atrium, which by their association and histopathological lineage, are extremely rare. The clinical, echocardiographic and pathological findings were analysed. The first case was asymptomatic, but in the control studies of colon adenocarcinoma, an intracardiac mass was found by chest computed tomography (CT).

Altered flow-mediated vasodilatation, low paraoxonase-1 activity, and abnormal high-density lipoprotein subclass distribution in Takayasu's arteritis.

Background: Takayasu's arteritis (TA) is an idiopathic chronic inflammatory disease that causes occlusion of large arteries, but little is known about whether affected patients are characterized by endothelial dysfunction, different high-density lipoproteins (HDL) subclasses and paraoxonase-1 (PON1) activity.

Methods And Results: In the present study, 30 patients with TA, 30 age- and gender-matched volunteers (controls) and 15 patients with essential hypertension were studied. Flow-mediated vasodilation (FMD) and maximal blood flow velocity, assessed in the brachial artery by high-resolution ultrasound, were significantly lower in patients.