Background: Tracking national croup trends can provide important insights for childhood health management. This study aimed to analyze the incidence and drug prescription trends in Korean children over a two-decade period. Methods: This population-based study encompassed 479,783 children aged < 5 years from 2002–2019, utilizing the National Health Insurance Service-National Sample Cohort. We identified participants with a primary croup diagnosis who were admitted to or visited the emergency room. Age-specific and age-adjusted incidence rates/10,000 person-years were calculated. We assessed using orthogonal polynomial contrasts and stratified by various factors (sex, age, residential area, economic status, comorbidities, and healthcare facility types). We observed changes in the use of five medications: inhaled steroids, systemic steroids, inhaled epinephrine, antibiotics, and short-acting bronchodilators. Generalized binomial logistic regression was used to analyze factors influencing prescription strategies. Results: In 2002, the croup-related visits were 16.1/10,000 person-years, increasing to 98.3 in 2019 (Pfor trend < 0.001). This trend persisted, regardless of age, sex, region, and economic status. Children with comorbid atopic dermatitis or asthma maintained consistent croup rates, while those without comorbidities increased. Treatment trends showed decreasing antibiotic (73–47%) and oxygen use (21.3–3.4%), with increasing nebulized epinephrine (9.3–41.5%) and multiple drug prescriptions (67.8–80.3%). Primary care centers exhibited a greater increase in prescription usage and hospitalization duration than did tertiary healthcare institutions. Conclusion Over the past two decades, croup incidence has risen, accompanied by increased epinephrine use and decreased antibiotic prescriptions. Longer hospitalization and higher medication use were mainly observed in primary care facilities.

Submental intubation has been the recommended airway management procedure for maxillofacial surgery since proposed by Altemir in 1986. We adopted various submental intubation modifications based on modified intubation protocols and report on the effectiveness and problems of each modified method. Case: Among a total of 13 submental intubation cases during the last five years, five representative methods are described. The proximal end of the endotracheal tube was protected by a nelaton catheter in case 1, by a suction connector in case 2, and by a dental needle cap in case 3. In case 4, a nasal speculum was used to expand a single route, and in case 5, a laparoscopic trocar was used to secure a single route. Conclusions: Use of a laparoscopic trocar might be the most effective way to obtain a single submental route. However, considering cost, use of a nasal speculum is also an effective suboptimal solution.

Purpose: Quality of life (QOL) has become important in the trend of emphasizing patient satisfaction. This study aimed to evaluate the QOL in patients who underwent laparoscopic or robotic gastrectomy for gastric cancer. Methods: A prospective trial was performed involving patients who underwent laparoscopic or robotic gastrectomy for primary gastric cancer at 11 hospitals in Korea. Within this comparative trial, QOL, postoperative pain, and long-term complications were exanimated. The quality-of-life questionnaire (QLQ)-C30 and QLQ-STO22 developed by the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer were used for the QOL survey. We compared the data after dividing it into several types of characteristics as follows; device (robotic or laparoscopic), operation type, pathological stage, and sex.Biased components were extracted by logistic regression analysis. Propensity score matching was applied to the data set with the biased components. Results: In total, 434 patients (211 for laparoscopic surgery and 223 for robotic surgery) were enrolled, out of which 321 patients who responded to both preoperative and postoperative surveys were selected for analysis. Robotic gastrectomy was not different from laparoscopic gastrectomy with respect to postoperative QOL. Distal gastrectomy showed better scores than total gastrectomy in terms of role functioning, social functioning, fatigue, nausea/vomiting, pain, dyspnea, constipation, financial difficulties, dysphagia, eating restrictions, anxiety, taste, and body image. Male patients showed better scores on the 19 scales compared to female patients. Conclusion Robotic and laparoscopic approaches for gastric cancer surgery did not differ from each other with respect to QOL. Distal gastrectomy resulted in better QOL than total gastrectomy.

Perioperative stroke can lead to mortality or serious disability and usually occurs in patients undergoing cardiac, vascular, or neurologic surgery; it is rare in gynecological surgery. We report the case of a patient who suffered life-threatening cerebral infarction after elective laparoscopic hysterectomy. During the surgery, the patient was placed in the Trendelenburg position. On postoperative day one, the patient was diagnosed with right hemisphere cerebral infarction; brain computed tomographic angiography showed proximal right internal carotid artery occlusion. Decompressive craniectomy was performed to resolve brain swelling, but the patient died 10 days later.
Angiography ; Brain ; Brain Edema ; Carotid Artery, Internal ; Cerebral Infarction* ; Decompressive Craniectomy ; Female ; Gynecologic Surgical Procedures ; Head-Down Tilt* ; Humans ; Hysterectomy* ; Mortality ; Stroke

Poststreptococcal glomerulonephritis (PSGN) is one of the most well-known and important infectious renal diseases resulting from a prior infection with group A beta-hemolytic streptococcus. The typical clinical characteristics of the disease reflect acute onset with gross hematuria, edema, hypertension and moderate proteinuria after the antecedent streptococcal infection. In children, usually PSGN is healed spontaneously but if it combines with fast progressing glomerulonephritis, it would be developed to chronic renal failure. Therefore, it is important to make a fast diagnosis and treatment by simple tools to predict the course and the prognosis of disease. Sonography is a simple tool for diagnosis but there is no typical renal sonographic finding in PSGN, so it is difficult to predict the course and the prognosis of disease by sonographic findings. In comparison between two cases of renal sonographic findings in PSGN, a patient who showed more increased echogenicity in more extended area of renal sonography had the severe results of renal pathology, prolonged treatment period and low serum C3 level. Here, we report the different findings of renal sonography and pathology depending on the degree of severity between two patients. Thus, it is necessary to gather more information from further studies to make a consensus about the relationship between the renal sonography and the prognosis of disease in PSGN.
Child ; Consensus ; Diagnosis ; Edema ; Glomerulonephritis* ; Hematuria ; Humans ; Hypertension ; Kidney Failure, Chronic ; Pathology ; Prognosis ; Proteinuria ; Streptococcal Infections ; Streptococcus ; Ultrasonography

The present study was carried out to examine the toxicity and target organs of oral cholera vaccine (OCV) after repeated oral administration in Sprague-Dawley rats for 6 weeks (3 administrations, once every 2 weeks). OCV is an inactivated oral cholera vaccine that contains Vibrio cholerae and confers protection against cholera caused by V. cholera serogroups O1 (Inaba and Ogawa serotypes) and O139 (strain 4260B). The animals were orally administered either OCV placebo (negative control) or OCV at a dose equivalent to 240 times the anticipated human dose. Throughout the administration period, no significant change was detected in clinical signs, body weight, food or water consumption, urinalysis results, hematological and clinical biochemistry test results, organ weights, necropsy, or histopathological examination results. Minor changes were found in hematological and clinical biochemistry tests; however, these changes were within normal ranges. The above results suggest that oral administration of OCV in rats did not induce any toxicologically meaningful changes, and the target organs could not be determined. This study was conducted in accordance with the guidelines established by Good Laboratory Practice (2009-183, KFDA, December 22, 2009) and the OECD Principles of Good Laboratory Practice (1997).
Administration, Oral ; Animals ; Biochemistry ; Body Weight ; Cholera ; Drinking ; Humans ; Organ Size ; Rats ; Rats, Sprague-Dawley ; Reference Values ; Urinalysis ; Vibrio cholerae

The purpose of this study was to investigate the clinical, laboratory, and pathologic characteristics of dense deposit disease (DDD) in Korean children and to determine whether these characteristics differ between Korean and American children with DDD. In 2010, we sent a structured protocol about DDD to pediatric nephrologists throughout Korea. The data collected were compared with previously published data on 14 American children with DDD. Korean children had lower 24-hr urine protein excretion and higher serum albumin levels than American children. The light microscopic findings revealed that a higher percentage of Korean children had membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis patterns (Korean, 77.8%; American, 28.6%, P = 0.036), whereas a higher percentage of American children had crescents (Korean, 0%; American, 78.6%, P < 0.001). The findings from the electron microscopy revealed that Korean children were more likely to have segmental electron dense deposits in the lamina densa of the glomerular basement membrane (Korean, 100%; American, 28.6%, P = 0.002); mesangial deposit was more frequent in American children (Korean, 66.7%; American, 100%, P = 0.047). The histological findings revealed that Korean children with DDD were more likely to show membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis patterns than American children. The degree of proteinuria and hypoalbuminemia was milder in Korean children than American children.
Adolescent ; Asian Continental Ancestry Group ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; Creatinine/blood ; Edema/etiology ; Female ; Glomerulonephritis, Membranoproliferative/*pathology ; Hematuria/etiology ; Humans ; Infant ; Infant, Newborn ; Male ; Microscopy, Electron ; Proteinuria/etiology ; Republic of Korea ; Serum Albumin/analysis ; United States

BACKGROUND: The grey zone of cervical cytology, and in particular atypical squamous cells, cannot exclude HSIL (ASC-H) causes diagnostic difficulties and increases medical expenses. We analyzed p16INK4a expression in ASC-H liquid-based cytology specimens (LBCS) to develop more effective methods for the management of ASC-H patients. METHODS: We carried out p16INK4a immunostaining with 57 LBCS of ASC-H diagnostic categories, all of which were histologically cofirmed and 43 cases of which were compared with the results of a human papillomavirus (HPV) chip test. RESULTS: p16INK4a immunostaining with ASC-H LBCS was positive in 20% (3/15) of cervicitis, 25.0% (3/12) of tissue-low-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion, 75.0% (18/24) of tissue-high grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (HSIL), and 100% (6/6) of invasive cancer cases. The positivity of p16INK4a in LBCS was correlated with higher grade of histologic diagnosis (r=0.578, p=0.000). The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV), and negative predictive value (NPV) of p16INK4a immunostaining for the prediction of tissue-HSIL+ were 80.0%, 77.8%, 80.0%, and 77.8%, respectively. The sensitivity, specificity, PPV, and NPV of p16INK4a immunostaining plus HPV chip test for predicting tissue-HSIL+ were 71.2%, 86.4%, 84.2%, and 79.2%. CONCLUSIONS: p16INK4a immunostaining as well as HPV chip testing with remaining LBCS with ASC-H are useful objective markers for the prediction of tissue-HSIL+.
Cervical Intraepithelial Neoplasia ; DNA Probes ; Humans ; Sensitivity and Specificity ; Uterine Cervical Neoplasms ; Uterine Cervicitis

Apocrine carcinoma arising from the apocrine sweat glands is a rare cutaneous malignant tumor which occurs predominantly in the axilla of elderly individuals. The typical histologic features of apocrine carcinoma is within a well developed glandular lumina with abundant eosinophilic cytoplasm and evidence of decapitation secretion. In rare instances, predominant signet ring cell features in apocrine carcinoma has been reported. We experienced a case that occured in the right axilla of a 59-year-old. Histopathologic examination showed a solid tumor that extended from the upper dermis into the subcutis, with a delicate infiltrate of epithelial cells. The cells had granular amphophilic cytoplasm, predominantly showed distinct signet ring cell morphology, and were strongly positive for epithelial mucin. Both lysozyme and gross cystic disease fluid protein-15 were identified in the tumor cells. We diagnosed this to be a case of primary signet ring cell apocrine carcinoma of the axilla after several immunohistochemical and clinical evaluations.
Aged ; Apocrine Glands ; Axilla ; Carcinoma, Signet Ring Cell ; Cytoplasm ; Decapitation ; Dermis ; Eosinophils ; Epithelial Cells ; Humans ; Middle Aged ; Mucins ; Muramidase ; Sweat Glands

BACKGROUND: Mutations of c-MYC have been described in cervical cancer. However, association between c-MYC gene status and its prognostic significance have not been clarified. METHODS: Tissue microarray sections from 144 patients with stage IB-IIB cervical cancer treated by radical hysterectomy were analyzed by fluorescence in situ hybridization using a region-specific probe for c-MYC and a centromere-specific probe for chromosome 8. RESULTS: Seventy five percent (108/144) of c-MYC gain and 6.9% (10/144) of c-MYC gene amplification were observed. c-MYC gene alteration was more frequently observed in squamous cell carcinoma than adenocarcinoma or adenosquamous carcinoma and were associated with low Ki67 labeling index (p=0.013). c-MYC amplification was not associated with clinicopathologic parameters except absence of bcl2 expression (p=0.048). Survival analysis revealed that patients with c-MYC amplification were significantly associated with higher risk of disease recurrence (p=0.007) and cancer related death (p=0.020). However, c-MYC gain was not associated with unfavorable outcome. Multivariate analysis proved c-MYC amplification as independent prognostic factors of shorter disease free survival and cancer-related death (p=0.028 and p=0.025, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: c-MYC amplification, not gain, is an independent prognostic marker for shorter disease free and cancer specific survival in cervical cancer treated by radical hysterectomy.
Adenocarcinoma ; Carcinoma, Adenosquamous ; Carcinoma, Squamous Cell ; Disease-Free Survival ; Fluorescence ; Genes, myc ; Humans ; Hysterectomy ; In Situ Hybridization ; In Situ Hybridization, Fluorescence ; Multivariate Analysis ; Prognosis ; Recurrence ; Uterine Cervical Neoplasms