No abstract available.

No abstract available.
Child* ; Humans ; Poisoning*

We report a case of xanthoma disseminatum in a 24 year old male paitient. Multiple yellow-brown papules developed on the flexor aurfaces, such as the neck, axillae, antecubital fossae, groin, and perianal regions. Some papules were detected arouns the eyes and uvulai. biopsy specimen revealed a dense infiltrate of histiocytes, foam cells, Touton giant cells, and other inflammatory cells. No Langerhans granules were seen in the electron microscopic analysis.
Axilla ; Biopsy ; Foam Cells ; Giant Cells ; Groin ; Histiocytes ; Histiocytosis, Non-Langerhans-Cell* ; Humans ; Male ; Neck ; Xanthomatosis* ; Young Adult

Myocardial scintigraphy is a widely used noninvasive procedure with high sensitivity for the detection of patients with suspected coronary artery disease. The purpose of this study was to determine the prognostic value of a normal myocardial scintigraphy in 292 patients (150 males, 142 females, mean age 53+/-12 years) with chest pain who were followed from 7 to 58 (mean 25) months. Myocardial SPECT was performed with Tc-99m MIBI in 173 patients, with Tc-99m tetrofosmin in 74 patients and with T1-201 in 45 patients. During the follow-up period, there were 2 cardiac deaths and 2 nonfatal myocardial infarctions resulting in cardiac event rate of 1.37% (0.66% per year). The cardiac event rate was not different in patients with angiographically normal coronary arteries (1/30, 3.3%) and in those who had significant coronary a disease (2/27, 7.4%) (p=0.60). In conclusion, patients with chest pain and normal myocardial scintigraphy have a low cardiac event rate, and there was no significant difference of cardiac event rates between patients with normal and abnormal coronary angiograms.
Chest Pain* ; Coronary Artery Disease ; Coronary Vessels ; Death ; Female ; Follow-Up Studies ; Humans ; Male ; Myocardial Infarction ; Myocardial Perfusion Imaging ; Perfusion Imaging* ; Perfusion* ; Prognosis ; Thorax* ; Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon

It has been shown that both rest and stress myocardial perfusion imagings with technetium agents can be performed on the same day using two different doses injected within few hours. The purpose of this study was to compare the two protocols (stress-rest and rest-stress) in detecting coronary artery diseases. One hundred and sixty patients (101 males, 59 females, mean age 57+/-9 years) and 120 patients (79 males, 41 females, mean age 59+/-10 years) underwent stress-rest myocardial perfusion SPECT and rest-stress myocardial perfusion SPECT, respectively All of them underwent both myocardial perfusion SPECT and coronary angiography within 1 month. A coronary stenosis was considered significant when it compromised the luminal diameter by> or =50%. The chi square test was used to compare differences in sensitivity, specificity and accuracy between the two groups. The overall sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of stress-rest protocol were 99%, 35%and 68%, respectively. Those of rest-stress protocol were 96%, 47%, and 78%, respectively. There was no difference between the two protocols in identifying individual diseased coronary artery branches. Therefore, one day stress-rest and rest-stress myocardial SPECT using Tc-99m agents were comparable and were very sensitive tests in detecting coronary artery diseases.
Coronary Angiography ; Coronary Artery Disease* ; Coronary Stenosis ; Coronary Vessels* ; Female ; Humans ; Male ; Perfusion Imaging ; Perfusion* ; Phenobarbital ; Sensitivity and Specificity ; Technetium ; Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon

No abstract available.
Humans ; Inpatients*

The third complementarity determining region (CDR3) of the immunoglobulin (Ig) kappa () chain is known to be located at the center of antigen binding groove and critical for antibody specificity. Ig chain has been characterized by limited junctional diversity due to the absence of N-region addition resulting in relative conservation of CDR3 lengths with 9 or 10 amino acids. CDR3 region of 11 amino acids is only possible with N-region addition. Recently, x transcripts with 11 amino acids CDR3 was found to be expressed in normal individuals, and in autoimrnune disease such as rheumatoid arthritis, the fraction of 11 amino acids CDR3 of humkv325-derived chains was overexpressed compared to conventional adult peripheral B cells. However, the significance of this bias is difficult to interpret without a clear understanding of normal repertoire of CDR3 length during development. The purpose of this study is to determine whether developmental regulation of CDR3 amino acids codon lengths exists in chains expressed in the fetal liver, cord blood, and adult peripheral blood lymphocytes (PBL). Lymphocytes were seperated from fetal liver, cord blood and adult PBL and cDNA was generated from extracted mRNA. PCR-based CDR3 finger- printing assay was performed with VI-IV family specific primers. CDR3 length diversity of Ig x chain increases as the development proceeds. The length diversity most frequently occured in Vlll family derived transcripts including 11 amino acids CDR3. transcripts with 11 amino acids CDR3 were consitently expressed in both fetal and adult Ig repertoire. These results support the hypothesis that v chain CDR3 length is developmentally regulated and implicates the diversity of antigen-antibody specificity generation.
Adult ; Amino Acids ; Antibody Specificity ; Arthritis, Rheumatoid ; B-Lymphocytes ; Bias (Epidemiology) ; Codon ; Complementarity Determining Regions ; DNA, Complementary ; Fetal Blood ; Humans* ; Immunoglobulin kappa-Chains* ; Immunoglobulins* ; Liver ; Lymphocytes ; RNA, Messenger ; Sensitivity and Specificity

The uptake of glucose for metabolism and growth is essential to most animal cells and is mediated by glucose-transporter (GLUT) proteins. The aim of this study was to determine which class of glucose transporter molecules was responsible for uptake of glucose in the mouse early embryo and at which stage the corresponding genes were expressed. In addition, co-culture system with vero cell was used to investigate the effect of the system on GLUT expression. Two-cell stage embryos were collected from the superovulated ICR female and divided into 3 groups. As a control, embryos were cultured in 0.4% BSA-T6 medium which includes glucose. For the experimental groups, embryos were cultured in either co-culture system with vero cells or glucose-free 76 medium supplemented with 0.4% BSA and pyruvate as an energy substrate. 2-cell to blastocyst stage embryos in those groups were respectively collected into microtubes (50 embryos/tube). Total RNA was extracted and RT-PCR was performed. The products were analysed after staining ethidium bromide by 2% agarose gel electrophoresis. Blastocysts were collected from each group at 120hr after hCG injection. They were fixed in 2.5% glutaraldehyde, stained with hoechst, and mounted for observation. In control, GLUT1 was expressed from 4-cell to blastocyst. GLUT2 and GLUT3 were expressed in morula and blastocyst. GLUT4 was expressed in all stages. When embryos were cultured in glucose-free medium, no significant difference was shown in the expression of GLUTI1, 2 and 3, compared to control. However GLUT4 was not expressed until morular stage. When embryos were co-cultured with vero cell, there was no significant difference in the expression of GLUT1, 2, 3 and 4 compared to control. To determine cell growth of embryos, the average cell number of blastocyst was counted. The cell number of co-culture (93.8+/-3.1, n=35) is significantly higher than that of control and glucose-free group (76.6 +/- 3.8, n=35 and 68.2+/-4.3, n=30). This study shows that the GLUT genes are expressed differently according to embryo stage. GLUTs were detectable throughout mouse preimplantation development in control and co-culture groups. However, GLUT4 was not detected from 2- to 8-cell stage but detected from morula stage in glucose-free medium, suggested that GLUT genes are expressed autocrinally in the embryo regardless of the presence of glucose as an energy substrate. In addition, co-culture system can increase the cell count of blastocyst but not improve the expression of GLUT. In conclusion, expression of GLUT is dependent on embryo stage in preimplantation embryo development.
Animals ; Blastocyst ; Cell Count ; Coculture Techniques ; Electrophoresis, Agar Gel ; Embryonic Development ; Embryonic Structures* ; Ethidium ; Female ; Glucose Transport Proteins, Facilitative* ; Glucose* ; Glutaral ; Humans ; Metabolism ; Mice* ; Morula ; Pregnancy ; Pyruvic Acid ; RNA ; Vero Cells

OBJECTIVES: Decreased pain sensitivity to the external stimuli was sought by measuring the pressure pain thresholds in patients with schizophrenia. In the case of the pain insensitivity(PI) being confirmed, the relationship between psychiatric symptoms and PI was to evaluated. METHODS: 21 schizophrenic and 23 healthy controls were enrolled. Pressure pain thresholds(PPT) were measured by pressure algometer on initial and recovered phase, and positive and negative symptoms by PANSS(Positive and Negative Symptoms Scale)(Stanley et al. 1991) were obtained in patient group. The confounding factor induced by antipsychotics to the PPT was controlled for. Comparisons of PPT between two groups, and correlations of PPT and psychiatric symptoms in patient group were tested. RESULTS: 1) Schizophrenic patients with active psychotic symptoms showed higher PPT compared to healthy controls. 2) When psychiatric symptoms were improved, PPT was decreased to the level of healthy controls. 3) Only the subscale of delusion in PANSS was closely correlated with PPT in patients with schizophrenia. 4) The dose of antipsychotics did not influence the PPT of the patient group. CONCLUSIONS: A part of patients with schizophrenia revealed they had higher pressure pain thresholds, which suggested PI in active symptom phase. However, PPT were restored almost to the level of normal controls when psychotic symptoms were improved. Thus, PI seemed to be a transient phenomenon rather than a persistent one. Changes of pain sensitivity to the external stimuli in schizophrenics would be associated with severity of delusion based upon reversible changes of brain function. Decreased attention due to delusion or lack of motivation seemed to be causal factors of PI. Clinicians should give attention to PI in schizophrenic patients to prevent physical illness and serious injuries in them.
Antipsychotic Agents ; Brain ; Delusions ; Humans ; Motivation ; Pain Threshold* ; Schizophrenia*