In order to obsetve the effect of stroke on hypothalamic-pituitary axis, TRH stimulabon test and dexamethasone suppression test(DST) were performed in 52 patients with stroke(cerebral infarction, 16 cases; intracerebral hemorrhage, 15 cases: subarachnoid hemorrhage, 21 cases) and 15 age-sex matched patients control without intracrania disease at Keimyung University Dongsan Hospital from April 1987 to August 1988. The results summarized as follows. 1. The frequency of blunted response on TRH stimulation test is significantly higher in total stroke and patients with cerebral infarction than in control(P<0.06, P<0.05). 2. The frequency of DST non-suppression in patients with cerebral infarction is significantly higher than in control, patients with cerebral hemorrhage and patients with subarachnoid hemorrhage(P<0.001, P<0.01, P<0.01). 3. Patients with left hemispheric stroke tend to show more frequent abnormal neuroendocrine test results than patient with right hemispheric stroke. 4. There are no correlation between abnormal neuroendocrine test results and age, sex, size of stroke and Barthel ADL scale. These results suggest stroke can influence on hypothalamic-pituitary axis, more marked in cerebral infarction and left hemispheric lesion.
Activities of Daily Living ; Axis, Cervical Vertebra ; Cerebral Hemorrhage ; Cerebral Infarction ; Dexamethasone ; Humans ; Infarction ; Stroke* ; Subarachnoid Hemorrhage

Vibrio cholerae strain other than O1 and O139 (Vibrio cholerae non-O1/O139) are associated with sporadic diarrhea and have often been reported in association with extraintestinal infections. We report a case of peritonitis by V. cholerae non-O1/O139 in 43-year-old male who was diagnosed cirrhosis. He, was complained of abdominal distension and fever without history of consumption of raw sea food and exposure to sea water. Gram negative bacilli were cultured from his peritoneal fluid and identified as V. cholerae sero group O14.
Adult ; Ascitic Fluid ; Cholera ; Diarrhea ; Fever ; Fibrosis ; Humans ; Male ; Peritonitis* ; Seafood ; Seawater ; Vibrio cholerae* ; Vibrio*

Vibrio cholerae strain other than O1 and O139 (Vibrio cholerae non-O1/O139) are associated with sporadic diarrhea and have often been reported in association with extraintestinal infections. We report a case of peritonitis by V. cholerae non-O1/O139 in 43-year-old male who was diagnosed cirrhosis. He, was complained of abdominal distension and fever without history of consumption of raw sea food and exposure to sea water. Gram negative bacilli were cultured from his peritoneal fluid and identified as V. cholerae sero group O14.
Adult ; Ascitic Fluid ; Cholera ; Diarrhea ; Fever ; Fibrosis ; Humans ; Male ; Peritonitis* ; Seafood ; Seawater ; Vibrio cholerae* ; Vibrio*

BACKGROUND: This study aimed to assess the status of infection control during influenza A pandemic (H1N1) 2009. METHODS: A questionnaire survey was conducted in November 2009 at the 100 hospitals designated by the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) as influenza A pandemic (H1N1) 2009-treatment institutions. RESULTS: In 32.3% of the hospitals, the ventilation system of the influenza A pandemic (H1N1) 2009 isolation ward was separated from the hospital's ventilation system. With regard to wearing personal protective equipment while caring for patients with H1N1 infection, during usual patient contact, masks were always worn by all medical staff at all the hospitals; however, medical staff at 38.7% and 51.6% of the hospitals did not wear gloves and gowns, respectively. During aerosol-generating procedures, some medical staff wore surgical masks, whereas medical staff at 10% and 23.3% of the hospitals did not wear gowns and protective goggles, respectively. In all, 64.5% of the hospitals responded that the contents of the guidelines established by the KCDC were insufficient for reference purposes in actual practice. CONCLUSION: Some of influenza A pandemic (H1N1) 2009-treatment institutions are believed to be inadequate in facilities, infection control during patient treatment, and administrative measures among their efforts to prevent transmission in hospital. In preparation against the outbreak of similar diseases in the future, the government needs to establish guidelines highly applicable by medical staff, to secure exclusive spaces and personnel for treating infectious disease patients, and to develop personal protective gear support and management systems.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (U.S.) ; Communicable Diseases ; Delivery of Health Care ; Eye Protective Devices ; Humans ; Infection Control ; Influenza, Human ; Korea ; Masks ; Medical Staff ; Pandemics ; Ventilation ; Surveys and Questionnaires

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Plasma levels of MCP-1, RANTES and IL-18 are related to allergic diseases such as atopic dermatitis or asthma. But it is not well investigated in allergic rhinitis. We evaluated the association of plasma concentrations of these cytokines and allergic rhinitis. SUBJECTS AND METHOD: The concentrations of plasma MCP-1, RANTES and IL-18 were analyzed by ELISA. The levels of cytokines were compared between perennial allergic rhinitis patients (n=48) and controls (n=33), and this depended on symptom severity. RESULTS: Plasma levels of MCP-1 and IL-18 were significantly increased more in allergic rhinitis patients (MCP-1, 108 pg/mL, p<0.01; IL-18, 299 pg/mL, p<0.01) than in controls (MCP-1, 86 pg/mL; IL-18, 168 pg/mL). Especially, the levels of moderate-severe allergic rhinitis group (MCP-1, 116 pg/mL; IL-18, 329 pg/mL) showed higher tendency than mild one (MCP-1, 101 pg/mL; IL-18, 273 pg/mL). However, the levels of RANTES did not exhibit any differences between allergic rhinitis and control. CONCLUSION: Our results suggest that plasma MCP-1 and IL-18 might be associated with nasal inflammation of perennial allergic rhinitis, especially in severely symptomatic patients.
Asthma ; Chemokine CCL5* ; Cytokines ; Dermatitis, Atopic ; Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay ; Humans ; Inflammation ; Interleukin-18* ; Plasma* ; Rhinitis*

The purpose of this study was to analyse the various patterns of calcification demonstrated in the anteriorand lateral neck roentgenograms of 213 unselected patients with thyroid enlargement. The patterns of thyroidcalcifications were correlated with clinical, surgical and histological findings. The results were as follows: 1.Of 213 cases of thyroid enlargement, 180 cases were benign and 168 cases were female. 2. The calcification ratewas high in the chronic thyroid enlargement. 3. The incidence of calcification was 30.2% in the malignancy and17.2% in the benign disease. There was no clacification in the Hashimoto's disease. 4. The nodular calcificationwas demonstrated in the both benign and malignant disease but curvilinear calcifiation was predominantly seen inbenign disease.
Female ; Hashimoto Disease ; Humans ; Incidence ; Neck ; Thyroid Gland

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Low levels of soluble receptor for advanced glycation end products (sRAGE) are associated with three conventional vascular risk factors (3Fs: diabetes, hypertension, and hypercholesterolemia), nondiabetic coronary artery disease, and Alzheimer's disease. However, the association between sRAGE and acute ischemic stroke (AS), especially AS without a source of cardioembolism, has not yet been established. Methods: Patients with AS without a source of cardioembolism (n=259) and age-matched controls (n=300) were grouped according to the presence of 3Fs: AS patients with and without 3Fs (3Fs+ AS and 3Fs- AS, respectively) and controls with and without 3Fs (3Fs+ control and 3Fs- control, respectively). Levels of sRAGE were analyzed among the four groups. RESULTS: sRAGE was significantly higher in the controls than in the AS patients (855 pg/mL vs. 690 pg/mL, p<0.01). sRAGE was significantly higher in 3Fs- controls (996 pg/mL, p<0.05) than in 3Fs+ controls (721 pg/mL), and in AS group regardless of the 3Fs (629 pg/mL in 3Fs- and 705 pg/mL in 3Fs+). The lowest tertile of sRAGE was associated with an increased risk of AS in the 3Fs- group [adjusted odds ratio (OR) 4.0, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.6-10.3, p<0.01] but not in the 3Fs+ group. The level of sRAGE was also correlated with neurological severity in the 3Fs- AS group (r=-0.32, p<0.05) but not in the 3Fs+ AS group. CONCLUSIONS: Low plasma levels of sRAGE is a potential biomarker for the risk of AS and may reflect the neurological severity of the condition, especially in subjects without identifiable conventional risk factors.
Alzheimer Disease ; Coronary Artery Disease ; Glycosylation End Products, Advanced ; Humans ; Hypercholesterolemia ; Hypertension ; Odds Ratio ; Plasma ; Risk Factors ; Stroke

BACKGROUND: Nowadays, many laboratories use computer and karyotyping software in chromosome analysis on the development of computer and digital imaging technology. And some of these softwares, such as QuipsTM (Vysis, USA; QuipsTM), are those operated in Macintosh operating system (Mac OS) because it had been considered superior to IBM PC in imaging works. However, Korean users have had difficulties in use of Korean letter "Hangul" because many of these hadn't been operated in Korean Macintosh System (KH series). METHODS: We used a karyotyping software of Macintosh QuipsTM 3.0, which is inconvenient to manage patient informations such as name, department, doctor's name and etc. In order to use "Hangul" in QuipsTM 3.0, we incorporated some files (WorldScript II and ScriptSwitcher 8 along with other files such as fonts, "Imrykki" and etc.) from KH 8.0 (Elex, Co; Korean Macintosh system) to Mac OS 8.0 (Apple, Inc; English Macintosh system). RESULTS: After modifing the operating system of Mac OS 8.0, we could use not only "Hangul", but also Chinese letter "Hanja" and special characters (e.g., "alpha", "-->", and etc). CONCLUSIONS: In using "Hangul" in data management and reporting, we became to be familiar with QuipsTM and had good responses from clinicians.
Asian Continental Ancestry Group ; Humans ; Karyotyping

BACKGROUND: Interleukin (IL)-18, a potent inducer of interferon gamma (IFN-gamma), is known to have a role in diseases involving type-2 T helper cell responses including atopic dermatitis. In this study, we aimed to determine the clinical significance of serum IL-18 level in the patients with atopic dermatitis. METHODS: Serum concentration of IL-18, IFN-gamma, IgE, and blood eosinophil were measured in the patients with atopic dermatitis and healthy control subjects, and their association with the clinical score of the disease was analysed. RESULTS: Serum concentrations of IL-18 were significantly elevated in patients with atopic dermatitis compared to the healthy controls (332 pg/mL vs 151 pg/mL, P<0.05). Serum levels of IL-18 (r=0.41, P=0.001), eosinophil (r=0.36, P=0.003), and IgE (r=0.32, P=0.009) correlated with clinical scores in the patients. Also, multiple regression analysis indicated that serum IL-18 and IgE levels were independent predictors for the clinical score of atopic dermatitis (r2=0.25, beta=0.39, P=0.001 and beta=0.32, P=0.009). CONCLUSIONS: Our results confirmed a significant correlation between the concentration of serum IL-18 and the severity of atopic dermatitis. Although serum IL-18 concentration reflects the disease severity, its usefulness as a clinical test needs to be further investigated, because its additive benefit over those of conventional blood tests is not evident so far.
Adolescent ; Adult ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; Dermatitis, Atopic/*diagnosis ; Female ; Humans ; Immunoglobulin E/blood ; Interleukin-18/*blood ; Male ; ROC Curve ; Severity of Illness Index

BACKGROUND: The Immulite 2000 (Diagnostic Products Corp., LA, USA) is a new fully automated chemiluminescent immunoanalyzer. We evaluated the analytical performance of the Immulite 2000. METHODS: We assayed for five tumor markers (alpha-fetoprotein, carcinoembryonic antigen, human chorionic gonadotropin, prostate-pecific antigen, and free prostate-pecific antigen), four reproductive hormones (estradiol, follicle-timulating hormone, luteinizing hormone, and prolactin) and ferritin. Within-un and between-ay precision, linearity, recovery rates, interference, detection limits, comparison with other machines were evaluated. The carry over and hook effct for HCG (human chorionic gonadotropin) were also evaluated. RESULTS: Within-un and between-ay precisions (CVs) were less than 7.0%, 9.1% respectively. The linearity was good for all assays. The recovery rates were also acceptable. No significant analytical interference was caused by hemoglobin (up to 2,000 mg/L), triglyceride (up to 46 mmol/L), and bilirubin (up to 257 micromol/L) for all assays except for estradiol at high concentration of bilirubin. No sample-to-ample carry over was detected. A hook effect was not detected for HCG at the level of 909,000 IU/L. CONCLUSIONS: The Immulite 2000 was shown to have an satisfactory analytical performance for modern layout of the instrument, ease of use, minimal maintenance, as well as the analytical labor efficient productivity of wide variety of analytes. So we concluded that the system was highly suitable for implementation in an automated clinical laboratory.
Bilirubin ; Carcinoembryonic Antigen ; Chorionic Gonadotropin ; Efficiency ; Estradiol ; Ferritins ; Limit of Detection ; Luteinizing Hormone ; Triglycerides ; Biomarkers, Tumor