BACKGROUND: Care for prehospital cardiac arrest is one of the major concerns of emergency medical services. But, in Korea, prehospital emergency medical service systems are not yet well established. We tried to offer one of the fundamental data for development of these systems. METHODS: After application of exclusion criteria, 183 patients who transferred to emergency center of our hospital after cardiac arrest in consecutive 24 months from Jan,1,1994 to Dec,31,1995 were included in this study. Retrospective review of the hospital charts of these patients was done. For statistical analysis, we divided patients to some categories. t-test or chi-square analysis was used. RESULTS: 24 patients of the 183 patients were secondary visitors(cardiac arrest was occurred during transfer from other hospitals), 159 patients were primary visitors. In the primary visitor group, only one third was ambulance visitors, and there is no statistical differences between arrest time of ambulance visitors and non-ambulance visitors(35+/-27 vs 37+/-24 min, p=NS). No organized bystander CPR was done. After arrival, 131 patients received CPR and 87 patients(66.4%) were not responded, 31 patients(23.1%) experienced transient ROSC, 13 patients(10.0%) survived until discharge, and only 2 patients(1.5%) were returned to their lives. CONCLUSION: We failed to find significant statistical survival differences between ambulance visitors and non-ambulance visitors, between presumed cardiac etiology group and non-cardiac etiology group. Survival rate was high in witnessed arrest group than unwitnessed arrest group(14.5% vs 2.1%, p=0.015).
Ambulances ; Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation ; Emergencies ; Emergency Medical Services ; Heart Arrest* ; Humans ; Korea ; Retrospective Studies ; Survival Rate

Kawasaki disease (KD) is an immune-mediated disease which is a leading cause of acquired cardiovascular disease in developed country. Recently, tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-alpha) blocker, infliximab has been considered a promising option for patients with refractory KD. Although chronic use of a TNF-alpha blocker could increase risk of opportunistic infections, a few studies have documented that use of infliximab was safe without serious adverse effects in patients with KD. We observed serious bacterial infection after infliximab treatment in an infant with refractory KD. Our patient was a 5-month-old male infant diagnosed with KD who did not respond to repeated doses of intravenous immunoglobulin. We effectively treated him with a single infusion of infliximab (5 mg/kg), but gram-negative (Acinetobacter lwoffii) septicemia developed after infliximab infusion. Therefore, we report a case of serious septicemia after treatment with infliximab, and suggest considering the risk of severe infection when deciding whether to prescribe infliximab to an infant with refractory KD.
Bacterial Infections ; Cardiovascular Diseases ; Developed Countries ; Humans ; Immunoglobulins ; Infant* ; Male ; Mucocutaneous Lymph Node Syndrome* ; Opportunistic Infections ; Sepsis* ; Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha ; Infliximab

Fetal teratomas rarely complicate pregnancy,having an incidance of only 20,000:1 to 40,000:1 of live births. Overthere, cervical teratomas are rare and accounts for only 5.5% of all neonatal teratomas. We have experienced a large cervical immature teratoma and present this case with a brief review of literatures.
Live Birth ; Teratoma*

BACKGROUND: It is controversial whether the delay of surgery for acute appendicitis by physician results in higher morbidity. Our present study explores this problem of physician delay on the postoperative outcome of patients with acute appendicitis. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Among 432 patients admitted for the presumptive diagnosis of acute appendicitis between Jan., 1995 and Dec., 1997, 358 patients with pathologically proven acute appendicits were analyzed. Physician delay from the hospital admission to the surgery was evaluated in relation to the stage of the disease at operation and postoperative outcome. RESULTS: Postoperative complications occurred signifficantly higher in advanced appendicitis group, than in simple appendicitis group. Postoperative oral consumption started significantly later and hospital days are significantly prolonged in those group. Both patient and physician delays significantly affect the stage of the disease. The finding that physician delay correlated with the stage, however, was denied by multivariate analysis. CONCLUSION: On the contrary to the patient delay, physician delay does not affect the stage of the acute appendicitis nor lead to increased incidence of postoperative complication. Physician delay to clarify the diagnosis is a reasonable strategy and it does not affect the outcome adversely.
Appendicitis* ; Diagnosis ; Humans ; Incidence ; Multivariate Analysis ; Postoperative Complications

BACKGROUND: Direct wet mount examination of vaginal secretion, widely applied for the diagnosis of Trichomonas vaginalis infection in woman patients, is rapid and economical. However, the sensitivity of this technique is not so high. In this study enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay(ELISA) was employed for the detection of serum anti-T. vaginalis IgG antibodies from vaginal trichomoniasis patients. METHODS: Eighty sera from trichomonoasis patients who visited a Dr. Yoon Kyong's Obstetric & Gynecologic Clinic in Songnam and 30 non-infected healthy men were tested for detection of anti-T. vaginalis IgG antibody. Soluble lysate and excretory-secretory antigen prepared by mixing of six isolates of T. vaginalis, and lysate from one isolate(KT4) were used as antigen for ELISA. RESULTS: The sensitivity of ELISA using lysate of six isolates was 95.0%, and the sensitivity of the lysate from KT4 and mixed excretory-secretory antigen from 6 isolates were 86.4% and 76.3%, respectively. Specificities of ELISA by three 93.3%, 96.3% and 92.0%, respectively. CONCLUSION: It is suggested that ELISA using mixed lysate of T. vaginalis six isolates could be useful tools for the diagnosis of trichomoniasis.
Antibodies ; Diagnosis ; Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay ; Female ; Gyeonggi-do ; Humans ; Immunoglobulin G* ; Male ; Trichomonas vaginalis ; Trichomonas*

The purpose of this study was to compare the bracket placement and the shear bond strength of indirect-bonded brackets with those of direct-bonded ones. Forty eight extracted human teeth were collected and attached with brackets and tested on shear bond strength, using Instron. Fourteen patients from Wonkwang University Dental Hospital were selected for direct bonding of brackets and their teeth were measured on bracket angulation and bracket height. The obtained results were as follows: 1. The shear bond strengths of incisors were higher in direct-bonding,group, rather than in-direct-bonding group. But, the shear bond strength of premolars showed no significant differences between groups. 2. The bracket angulations of indirect-bonding group were preciser than those of direct-bonding group, especially in upper first premolars, lower lateral incisors, canines, premolars. 3. In bracket height, there were no significant differences between groups.
Bicuspid ; Humans ; Incisor ; Shear Strength* ; Tooth

High-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) is an emerging therapeutic tool for the effective thermal ablation of pathological tissue. For accurate localization of the target and safe control of the HIFU dosage, real-time imaging guidance during the HIFU exposure is desired. Ultrasound imaging has the capability to guide clinicians toward a lesion in real time, but is not an ideal option, as HIFU application causes strong interference, thereby substantially distorting the images used for guidance. Thus, this study introduces singular value decomposition–based filtering capable of restoring ultrasound harmonic images from HIFU interference without undesirable spectral distortion. The results were experimentally validated with a custom-made phantom, indicating that this approach effectively eliminates HIFU-induced artifacts, which is essential for real-time monitoring of the therapeutic process.

The indirect fluorescent antibody(IFA) test was used to detect serum IgG and IgM antibodies to Trichomonas vaginalis in 31 vaginal trichomoniasis, 7 candidiasis and in 20 non-infected healthy wonem with antigen prepared from axenic culture of Trichomonas vaginalis isolated from vulvovaginitis patient. The results were as follows: In 31 vaginal trichomoniasis the positive reactions of IgG antibody were 27 in the 1/8 dilution or higher and 4 in the 1/4 dilution whereas in healthy women the reaction showed signigicantly low as in the 1/4 dilution of below. The sensitivity and specificity of IFA test for IgG antibody to trichomonad antigen in this study were 87.1% and 100%, respectively. No significant difference of IgM antibody levels between vaginal trichomoniasis and healthy women was observed. No relation between the levels of IgG and IgM antibodies to trichomonad antigen by IFA test was observed. No relation between the time lapse and the level of serum IgG antibodies in IFA test of vaginal trichomoniasis was regarded. In conclusion the present study suggests that IFA test in trichomoniasis could be a useful tool for detection of anti-trichomonad IgG antibodies and applicable as an immundiagnostic method.
parasitology-protozoa ; Trichomonas vaginalis ; trichomoniasis ; diagnosis ; IgM ; IgG ; immunology

PURPOSE: This study was conducted to determine whether low intensity regular exercise following dexamethasone treatment could attenuate steroid-induced muscle atrophy. METHOD: 36 Wistar-rats(90-110g) were divided into six groups: control group(C), dexamethasone treatment group(D), sedentary group after normal sedentary period(C+S), sedentary group after dexamethasone treatment period(D+S), exercise group after normal sedentary period(C+E), and excercise group after dexamethasone treatment period(D+E). D, D+S, and D+E groups received dexamethasone injection(5mg/Kg) for seven days whereas C, C+S, and C+E groups received normal saline injection. Both C+E and D+E groups ran on a treadmill for 60 minutes/day(20minutes/4hours) at 15m/min and a 10degreegrade for seven recovery days. RESULT: Post-weight(body weight before muscle dissection) of D group significantly decreased by 16.03%, and that of D+E group significantly increased by 15.51% compared with pre-weight(body weight before steroid treatment). Type II muscle(plantaris and gastrocnemius) weights of D group were significantly lower than those of C group. Myofibrillar protein contents of type II muscles of D group tended to decrease comparing with C group. In D+E groups, body weights and relative weights of typeII muscles(muscle weight(mg)/post-weight(g)) tended to increase comparing with D+S group. CONCLUSION: It is suggested that steroid- induced muscle atrophy can be ameliorated through low intensity regular exercise after dexamethasone treatment.
Animals ; Body Weight ; Dexamethasone ; Muscle Fibers, Fast-Twitch ; Muscles* ; Muscular Atrophy ; Rats* ; Weights and Measures

BACKGROUND: The aim of this study was to evaluate the sensitivity of a clinicians' self-report method for the detection of nosocomial infections (NIs) in comparison with a total surveillance method in a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). METHODS: Two surveillance methods were concurrently performed in the NICU of a university hospital during 5 months in 2003. Clinicians' self-report surveillance (CSRS) was based on the retrospective verification of monthly reports of positive bacteriologic results by NICU clinicians. Total surveillance (TS) was done prospectively by an infection control nurse based on chart review and laboratory data. RESULTS: One hundred fifty nine patients accounting to 2759 patient-days were included in the study. Twenty-seven NIs among 26 patients were identified by TS. The sensitivity of CSRS compared to TS was 14.8% (4 of 27 NIs). The specificity was 98.5% (131 of 133 non-NIs). Kappa measures of agreement were -0.309. CONCLUSIONS: Our results confirm that the retrospective review of charts and laboratory data by clinicians lacks sensitivity and agreement for the surveillance of nosocomial infections.
Cross Infection* ; Humans ; Infant, Newborn ; Infection Control ; Intensive Care, Neonatal* ; Prospective Studies ; Retrospective Studies ; Sensitivity and Specificity