Treatment of recurrent gastrointestinal haemorrhage in a patient with von Willebrand's disease with administration of octreotide LAR and propranolol.

We report a patient with von Willebrand' s disease who had had recurrent and life-threatening bleeding from the gastrointestinal tract. Despite extensive investigation, no apparent cause of haemorrhage was identified. He was successfully treated with combined administration of octreotide LAR (long-acting release) and propranolol.

Intracellular and plasma cytokine profile in neonates born to non-atopic parents: the impact of breast feeding.

Unlabelled: The aim of this study was to profile the changes in intracellular and plasma cytokines during the neonatal period and evaluate the impact of breast feeding on these parameters. For this purpose, we measured the interleukin (IL)-2 and IL-4 producing CD3+/CD69+ T-cells using flow cytometry and plasma concentrations of interferon (IFN)-gamma and IL-4 using ELISA, in 122 healthy term neonates, aged 6-12 h, born to non-atopic parents, and 25 healthy children aged 1-12 years. A total of 42/122 neonates exclusively breast-fed (BF) and 39/122 formula fed (FF) were studied again on the 30th day of life for the above parameters.

Coronary artery disease and upper abdominal surgery: impact of anesthesia on perioperative myocardial ischemia.

Background/aims: Some papers claim that epidural anesthesia and analgesia lowers the incidence of perioperative ischemic events and may have a favorable effect on perioperative cardiac morbidity and mortality. We studied the effect of epidural anesthesia and analgesia on perioperative myocardial ischemia, in a group of patients with known coronary artery disease, who underwent upper abdominal surgery.

Methodology: Fifty patients with coronary artery disease scheduled for elective upper abdominal surgery, were randomized to two study groups: Group A (n = 25) received general anesthesia plus epidural anesthesia and analgesia, while group B (n = 25) received general anesthesia with postoperative i.

Flow cytometric measurement of HLA-DR expression on circulating monocytes in healthy and sick neonates using monocyte negative selection.

Unlabelled: The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of prematurity, neonatal sepsis, respiratory distress syndrome (RDS) and perinatal asphyxia on monocyte HLA-DR expression of neonates using a flow cytometric method based on monocyte negative selection. The subjects were one hundred and thirty-one neonates (59 healthy, 44 septicaemic, 20 with RDS and eight with perinatal asphyxia) and 20 healthy adults. Monocyte HLA-DR expression was measured using one-colour HLA-DR labelling in a gate for monocytes obtained using the combination of CD3-CD19--PE/CD15--FITC MoAbs.

Procalcitonin: does it play a role in male reproduction?

Objective: To investigate the presence or absence of procalcitonin in the seminal plasma of both normal and subfertile men.

Design: Controlled clinical study.

Setting: Academic research environment.

Corneal anesthesia in a case with Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada syndrome.

Purpose: To add clinical features to the description of the Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada syndrome.

Method: Case report.

Results: The case presented with a typical medical history of Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada syndrome, including headaches, low-grade fever, nuchal rigidity, and from the eyes bilateral visual loss, a reaction from the anterior chambers, bilateral uveities with localized exudative retinal detachment from the left.

Transfusion-dependent homozygous beta-thalassaemia major: successful pregnancy in five cases.

beta-Thalassaemia major is a severe, transfusion-dependent anaemia that also causes infertility due to iron deposition to endocrine organs. Very few pregnancies have been reported among such patients. In this report we describe the evolution and successful outcome of pregnancy in 5 Greek women with beta-thalassaemia major.

Responsiveness to recombinant human erythropoietin (rh-Epo) of marrow erythroid progenitors (CFU-E and BFU-E) from B-chronic lymphocytic leukemia (B-CLL).

The responsiveness of bone marrow erythroid progenitors (CFU-E and BFU-E) to various concentrations of recombinant human erythropoietin (rh-Epo) (2,5,20,40,100,200 and 500 U/ml) was investigated in vitro in 18 patients with B-chronic lymphocytic leukemia to assess the clinical usefulness of rh-Epo in this disease. Bone marrow mononuclear cells were cultured by methylcellulose methods for CFU-E and BFU-E assays. The B-chronic lymphocytic leukemia patients were divided into two groups according to the percentage of lymphocytes in the bone marrow (under 70% and over 70%).

The effect of radicular arteries ligation on the spinal cord blood supply in cats.

In order to study the contribution of the radicular arteries to the blood supply of the spinal cord, we performed experimental occlusion of these arteries in cats. In 43 cats, under thiopental anaesthesia, unilateral, bilateral, single or multiple ligations of dorsal radicular arteries were carried out. The animals were killed at the 1st, 2nd and 7th postoperative day.

Laparoscopic tubal surgery. A retrospective comparative study of open microsurgery versus laparoscopic surgery.

The aim of this study is to compare retrospectively the outcome of patients that underwent tubal surgery by laparotomy or laparoscopy by the same surgeon Thirty two women that presented with distal tubal obstruction were treated by laparoscopic tubal surgery and 38 by laparotomy and microsurgery. Patients were equally matched for age, duration of infertility and severity of disease. In all cases there were no injuries to adjacent groups and no additional surgery was needed.

Unusual course of an epidural rhabdomyosarcoma of the upper thoracic spine.

This report deals with a case of rhabdomyosarcoma in the upper thoracic spine. It is of particular interest, not only for the rarity of type and location of this tumour, but for its clinical course, which presented fluctuations of neurological status, included an acute demonstration of complete paraplegia followed by full recovery after conservative treatment, and gradual relapsing of neurological deficit, one year later.

Effects of adrenaline infusion on serum thromboxane B2 and plasma beta-thromboglobulin levels in hypertensive and normotensive subjects.

Adrenaline was infused in incremental doses of 0.05 up to 0.1 microgram/kg/min over a 60-min period in nine patients with mild essential hypertension and six age-matched normotensive controls.

Severe neutropenia in a patient with large granular lymphocytosis: prolonged successful control with cyclosporin A.

A case of severe neutropenia associated with large granular lymphocytosis in a 40-year-old female is described. The patient, with no findings of an underlying systemic disorder, had suffered from recurrent life threatening, mainly pseudomonal, infections for about two years, despite the various regimes tried. During the last twelve months cyclosporin A treatment resulted in a significant increase in absolute neutrophil counts, concomitant with a remarkable decrease in bone marrow infiltration by GLs and almost normal counts of GLs in the peripheral blood.

Evaluation of the ras and myc oncoproteins in benign gastric lesions.

Ras and c-myc oncoprotein expression was analyzed using specific monoclonal antibodies Y13-259 (for ras p21) and mycl-9E10 (for c-myc p62) in 144 histological sections derived from benign gastric lesions. Increased expression of ras p21 was observed in inflammatory metaplastic, dysplastic, hyperplastic and cystic histological changes, and on the basis of ras p21 staining three distinct histological groups emerged: (i) cystic changes, hyperplastic polyps; (ii) inflammatory gastritis; (iii) metaplastic, dysplastic and adenomatous polyps. Elevated levels of ras p21 expression were found at significantly higher levels than those of c-myc expression in dysplastic lesions.

Expression of the ras oncoprotein in gastric carcinomas and adjacent mucosa.

We have employed an immunohistochemical analysis to study the ras p21 oncoprotein in a total of 88 gastric carcinomas, which were associated (in 24 cases) with intestinal metaplasia. Our results suggest an association of the expression of ras p21 with metaplastic and neoplastic gastric mucosa. The comparative study showed that 58 of the 88 gastric carcinoma cases studied exhibited negative or equivocal staining (-/+).

Immunohistochemical analysis of the ras oncogene protein product in human thyroid neoplasms.

The monoclonal antibody Y13 259 to the ras oncogene p21 product was used in an immunohistochemical study of ras expression in human thyroid neoplasms. Both papillary and follicular carcinomas showed consistently higher staining intensity than normal tissue adjacent to carcinomas. Some follicular, foetal, embryonal and oxyphil adenomas exhibited higher staining intensity than normal tissue.