With the purpose of clarifying the etiology and its characteristics of PCA infarction, we analyzed 60 consecutive patients with cerebral infarction involving occipital-or inferior temporal lobes. To elucidate the underlying causes of PCA infarcts, we reviewed medical records for clinical and laboratory risk factors, neuroimaging studies, echocardiog.ram, and angiographic findings. The com non causes of PCA infarcts were thrombotic, embolic, unknown, and miscellaneous causes in decreasing order. The most common symptom was hemianopsia or cortical blindness. Sensorimotor symptoms were present in 36 patients and confusion in 16 patients. Confusion was closely correlated with old age or infarcts outside the PCA territory(p<0.05). The patients of either thrombotic or embolic infarcts were older than those of miscellaneous or unknown causes(p<0.05). Bilateral occlusions were less common in thrombotic and embolic infarct in comparison with miscellaneous causes. Atrial fibrillation or sick sinus syndrome were the usual causes of embolic infarct. In miscellaneous causes of infarct, migraine were in four patients. Clinical outcome was better in unknown causes than in thrombotic or miscellaneous causes of infarct (p<0.05). These findings revealed that thrombosis was a worse prognostic factor than embolism as well as a leading cause of PCA infarct.
Atrial Fibrillation ; Blindness, Cortical ; Cerebral Infarction ; Embolism ; Hemianopsia ; Humans ; Infarction, Posterior Cerebral Artery* ; Medical Records ; Migraine Disorders ; Neuroimaging ; Passive Cutaneous Anaphylaxis ; Posterior Cerebral Artery* ; Risk Factors ; Sick Sinus Syndrome ; Temporal Lobe ; Thrombosis

Trichorhinophalangeal syndiome, a rare genetic disease, is characterzed by the triad of slow growing, brittle hair with early loss, a pear-shaped nose with bulbous tip and long philtrum, and coneshaped phalangeal epiphyses wiith resultant shortening and. deformity of hands and feet. A 24-year-old female visited our department for the evaluation of lalopecia. She had had sparse, thin, and brittle hair since birth. She also complained of short fingers ar d a pear-shaped nose with bulbous tip. The X-ray findings of her hands and feet showed cone-shaped epiphyses with shortening of the phalangeal bones. There was no family history of hair, nasal, or palnkoplantar phalangeal abnormality. Chromosomal study did not reveel any abnormal finding. Shortened phalangeal bones of her index and middle fingers were slightly improved by lengthening procedure with iIlizarov apparatus.
Congenital Abnormalities ; Epiphyses ; Female ; Fingers ; Foot ; Hair ; Hand ; Humans ; Lip ; Nose ; Parturition ; Young Adult

We report here several experiences of interphase cytogenetics, using fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) technique, for the detection of chromosome aberrations. FISH, using alpha satellite specific probes of 18, X, Y chromosomes, was done in interphase nuclei from peripheral blood of patients with Edwards' syndrome, Klinefelter's syndrome and Turner's syndrome with healthy male and female controls, respectively. The distributions of fluorescent signals in 100 interphase nuclei were well correlated with metaphase findings. Nowadays FISH plays an increasingly important role in a variety of research areas, including cytogenetics, prenatal diagnosis, tumor biology, gene amplification and gene mapping.
Adolescent ; Adult ; Cell Nucleus/*ultrastructure ; Child ; Chromosome Aberrations/*physiology ; Chromosome Banding ; Female ; Humans ; In Situ Hybridization, Fluorescence ; Infant, Newborn ; Interphase/*physiology ; Male

Anetoderma or Macular atrophy is a rare cutaneous disorder showing local atrophy and macular discoloration related to a local dermal defect of elastic tissiie without any other apparent change in the skin, which may show familial occurrence, called familial anetoderma. A 13-year-old female complained 3-year history of multiple asyrnptomatic atrophic macules on the trunk and both lower extremities, especially on both this. Elastic stain of skin lesion showed decrease of lastic tissue in the dermis. No other syst mic abnormalities were found on phisical examination. Her sister had same skin lesion on lower extremities and both buttocks, and had no ther systemic abnormalities. Despite infrequent occurence, the development of anetoderma among familial members possibly represents a congcnital defect of elastin. Because variou ocular, bony, cardiac, and gastrointestinal abnormalilies have been reported in familial anetoilerma, long-term follow up would be necessary.
Adolescent ; Anetoderma* ; Atrophy ; Buttocks ; Dermis ; Elastin ; Female ; Follow-Up Studies ; Humans ; Lower Extremity ; Siblings ; Skin

No abstract available.
Angiogenesis Inhibitors/administration & dosage ; Bevacizumab/*administration & dosage ; Follow-Up Studies ; Humans ; Intravitreal Injections ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Optic Disk/*pathology ; POEMS Syndrome/*complications/diagnosis ; Papilledema/diagnosis/*drug therapy/etiology ; Tomography, Optical Coherence ; Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor A/*antagonists & inhibitors

From November 1987 to December 1995, 76 patients with periampullary cancer underwent resectional surgery in the department of surgery, Kosin medical college. The object of this study was to assess the prognostic factors of the periampullary cancer after pancreaticoduodenectomy. The postoperative mortality rate was 11.8%. Significant morbidity occurred in 39.5% of the patients, early reoperation was required in 9.2% of these patients, and the mean hospital stay was 21.7 days. Univariate analysis on all patients revealed that the survival rate was significantly related to the size of the tumor (> or =3.0 cm 13%, <3.0 cm 41.4%; p<0.05), lymph node status (invasion 8.7%, no invasion 31.8%; p<0.05) and the age of the patient (>50 20.5%, < or =50 34.5%; p<0.05). The site was less significant(distal CBD 27%, ampulla of Vater 16.7%, pancreas 9%, duodenum 2%; p>0.05). These results indicated that patients with a tumor size lesser than 3cm, without lymph node involvement, and under the age of 50 had a long term survival rate.
Ampulla of Vater ; Duodenum ; Humans ; Length of Stay ; Lymph Nodes ; Mortality ; Pancreas ; Pancreaticoduodenectomy* ; Reoperation ; Survival Rate

No abstract available.
Cardiac Catheterization* ; Cardiac Catheters* ; Cardiovascular Diseases* ; Child* ; Cineangiography* ; Heart Defects, Congenital ; Humans

Children's rectal cancer is a very rare condition and its reported incidence is below 0.5%. The prognosis is very poor due to the advanced stage at diagnosis and a higher malignant potential. Recently some authors treated rectal cancer of children with surgery and they have had a better prognosis. We experienced a case of rectal cancer in a 12 year old boy treated with surgery and chemotherapy and reviewed related literature.
Child* ; Diagnosis ; Drug Therapy ; Humans ; Incidence ; Male* ; Prognosis ; Rectal Neoplasms*

Prior to 1988, endometrial cancer was clinically staged but there was the considerable discrepancy between clinical and aetual stage. FIGO surgical staging classification of endometrial cancer(I988) provides the advanatage of recognizing the true disease distribution and extension, and more rational treatraent can be accomplished. This retrospective study was based on a clinical review of 73 patients with endometrial carcinoma from l982 through 1991 who underwent primary surgical evaluation. A11 cases were restaged ueing the newly adopted FIGO surgical staging. The distribution of FIGO clinical staging was as follows:85 patients(89.1%) were with stage I, 5(6.9%) with stage II, 2(2.7%) with stage III and 1(l.3%) with stage IV. Surgical restaging according new FlG0 classification reveald 56(76.7%) patients with stage I, 1(1.4%) with stage II, 14(19.2%) with stage III and 2(2.7%) with stage IV. Surgery upstaged 12.3% of clinical stage I patients, In clinical stage II patients, 80.0% was doenstaged. There wes no stage changing in cliaical stage III and IV patients. The acturial survival rates for surgical stages I a, I b, I c, and III were 80.0%, 77.2%, 68.4A%, and 35.0% respectively. By using FIGO surgical staging, the initial extent of endometrial cancer can be more accurately evaluated and we may predict prognosis and survival relatively well.
Classification ; Endometrial Neoplasms* ; Female ; Humans ; Prognosis ; Retrospective Studies ; Survival Rate

BACKGROUND: Flecainide is an antiarrhythmic agent that is used primarily in the treatment of cardiac arrhythmias. Some evidences also suggest that flecainide can participate in alveolar fluid clearance and inflammatory responses. This experiment was aimed to evaluate the effects of flecainide on sepsis induced acute lung injury in a rat model. METHODS: Rats were treated with subcutaneous infusion of saline or flecainide (0.1 or 0.2 mg/kg/hr) by a mini-osmotic pump. Subcutaneous infusion was started 3 hours before and continued until 8 hours after intraperitoneal injection of saline or endotoxin. Animals were sacrificed for analyses of severity of acute lung injury with wet to dry (W/D) ratio and lung injury score (LIS) in lung and inflammatory responses with level of leukocyte, polymorphonuclear neutrophils (PMNs) and inteleukin-8 (IL-8) in bronchoalveolar lavages fluid (BALF). RESULTS: Flecainide markedly improved dose dependently sepsis induced acute lung injury as analysed by W/D ratio (from 2.24 ± 0.11 to 1.76 ± 0.09, p < 0.05) and LIS (from 3 to 1, p < 0.05), and inflammatory response as determined by leukocyte (from 443 ± 127 to 229 ± 95, p < 0.05), PMNs (from 41.43 ± 17.63 to 2.43 ± 2.61, p < 0.05) and IL-8 (from 95.00 ± 15.28 to 40.00 ± 10.21, p < 0.05) in BALF. CONCLUSIONS: Flecanide improve sepsis induced acute lung injury in rats by controlling inflammatory responses.
Acute Lung Injury* ; Animals ; Arrhythmias, Cardiac ; Bronchoalveolar Lavage ; Flecainide* ; Infusions, Subcutaneous ; Injections, Intraperitoneal ; Interleukin-8 ; Leukocytes ; Lung ; Lung Injury ; Models, Animal ; Neutrophils ; Rats ; Sepsis*