Paroxysmal Nocturnal Hemoglobinuria (PNH) is an uncommon hematologic disease characterized by an abnormal sensitivity of blood cells to the lytic action of serum complement. We experienced one case of PNH in Yeungnam University Hospital from May 1983 to May 1989. The patients was followed up without severe complications of 4 years since diagnosis with the only conservative treatments such as washed blood transfusion, adrenal corticosteroids, androgens, folate and iron preparation, intermittently.
Adrenal Cortex Hormones ; Androgens ; Blood Cells ; Blood Transfusion ; Complement System Proteins ; Diagnosis ; Folic Acid ; Hematologic Diseases ; Hemoglobinuria, Paroxysmal* ; Humans ; Iron

No abstract available.
Child* ; Humans ; Occult Blood*

No abstract available.
Ductus Arteriosus* ; Indomethacin*

Thirty-nine patients with fixed drug eruption who visited the Department of Dermatology in National Medical Center from January 1g7g to December 1982 were selected. Among them, twentyseven patients performed skin biopsy and were evaluated histopathologically on the basis of duration. The results were as follows; ].In the early stage less than 1 week of duration, hydropic degeneration of basal cells, necrotic keratinocytes with eosinophilic cytoplasm and pknotic nucleus in the epidermis, and mixed cell infiltration with eosinophlis in the upper dermis were prominently. In the late stage more than 20 days of duration, acanthosis, an increased amount of melanin in the basal cell layer and presence of melanophages were found more prominent, however, hydropic degeneration of basal cells, papillary dermal ederna, inflammatory infiltration of mononuclear cells were found less prounced or absent.
Biopsy ; Cytoplasm ; Dermatology ; Dermis ; Drug Eruptions* ; Eosinophils ; Epidermis ; Humans ; Keratinocytes ; Melanins ; Skin

BACKGROUND: Serratia marcescens proliferates well in a humid environment or soil and is recently considered as an important pathogen for the severe nosocomial infections. this organism is spreads easily by hand-to-hand transmission, and contaminates medical equipment used for invasive procedures, working environment, medications, and soap. METHODS: We investigated the source of an outbreak of bloodstream infections by S. marcescens isolated that occurred during the period from July to December, 2004, at a university hospital in Gyeonggi Province and attempted to intervene in the outbreak and control it. RESULTS: From July to December, 2004, S. marcescens grew from 296 blood culture from 283 patients. The medical charts of the patients were reviewed, and surveillance cultures were taken to identify the outbreak of nosocomial infections and risk factors. Only four cases of infection were identified and all remaining positive blood cultures were due to contamination. Nine isolates randomly selected from the 296 S. marcescens showed an identical pulsed-field gel electrophoresis pattern. To identify the source of infection, environmental culture and hand cultures of the related medical workers were carried out, but S. marcescens was not isolated. CONCLUSION: As the result of aggressive infection control activities, such as re-education on environmental management methods, hand washing techniques, and blood culture sampling techniques, no more S. marcescens had been grown in blood culture since January, 2005.
Cross Infection ; Electrophoresis, Gel, Pulsed-Field ; Gyeonggi-do ; Hand ; Hand Disinfection ; Humans ; Infection Control ; Risk Factors ; Serratia marcescens ; Serratia* ; Soaps ; Soil

No abstract available.
Ascorbic Acid* ; Child* ; Humans

BACKGROUND: Gender and social relationships are believed to have a strong influence on health care attitudes and behavior. This study was designed to determine the effect of the gender of closely associated persons on t,he health care-seeking behavior of persons of the oppsite sex. METHODS: We developed a 10-item questionnaire that requested information on social and demographic characteristics, health status, and influences on the decision to seek health care, and administered it to 314 consecutive patients seen at two family medicine clinics in Seoul. Data were analyzed by means of one way analysis of variance for continuous variables and the chi-square test for categorical variables. Additionally, data were analyzed by means of a multivariate logistic regression model that calculated odds ratios and 95% confidence intervals. RESULTS: Men were 4.6 times more likely to be influenced than women to seek health care by a member of the opposite sex(95% CI, 2.4 to 8.9). CONCLUSIONS: Women make an important influene on the decisions for men to seek health care.
Delivery of Health Care ; Female ; Humans ; Logistic Models ; Male ; Odds Ratio ; Seoul ; Surveys and Questionnaires

No abstract available.

"It was reported that polymorphism of TNF alpha gene was present in promoter region and involves the substitution of guanine by adenosine in the uncommon (TNFA 2) allele. In this study, we investigated the significance of TNFA gene polymorphism in relation to various clinical characteristics and autoantibody profiles in SLE as well as comparing it with that of other countries, and also studied its association with peripheral TNF-a production in vitro. TNFA genotyping was performed in 126 SLE patients and 300 controls using DNA extracted from peripheral leucocytes. The biallelic polymorphism at position -308 of the TNFA promotor was determined by Ncol- RFLP. Peripheral mononuclear cell production of TNF-a was investigated by bioassay using L-929 cell cytotoxicity. The TNFA ""1 homozygote was a predominant allele (77.0%) in SLE, which was not different from the controls. TNFA ""2 homozygate was extremely rare in both patients and controls (0.8%, 1.3% respectively). The clinical manifestations between TNFA '1 and TNFA""2 did not differ. The production of autoantibodies including dsDNA, anti-La, anti-nRNP and anti-Sm was not different between two alleles, whereas anti- Ro antibody was more frequent in TNFA""1/TNFA '1 than in TNFA'1/TNFA'2 (62.1% vs 38.4%, P=0.022). The polymorphism of TNFA gene did not influence the lipopolysaccharide stimulated peripheral mononuclear cell production of TNF-a (1356+/-293 vs 1119+/-385 pg/ml; TNFA'1/TNFA'1, TNFA'1/TNFA'2 respectively). These results suggested that promoter polymorphism of TNFA was not directly involved in the susceptibility of SLE and was not responsible for differential peripheral TNF-a production, but TNFA ' may be associated with anti-Ro antibody production."
Adenosine ; Alleles ; Autoantibodies ; Biological Assay ; DNA ; Guanine ; Homozygote ; Humans ; Lupus Erythematosus, Systemic* ; Polymorphism, Restriction Fragment Length ; Promoter Regions, Genetic ; Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha*

No abstract available.
Child* ; Humans ; Infant, Newborn* ; Plasma* ; Renin*