No abstract available.
Hot Temperature* ; Orthodontic Wires*

No abstract available.
Aldosterone* ; Child* ; Humans ; Nephrosis, Lipoid*

Emergency cerclage commonly known as that performed in the setting of advanced cervical dilatation with bulging membranes and associated with significantly increased failure rates. We experienced a successful emergency cerclage for advanced incompetent internal os of cervix ( IIOC ). Pregnancy was prolonged and we delivered viable fetus. Hereby we report this case with the brief review of literature.
Cervix Uteri ; Emergencies* ; Female ; Fetus ; Labor Stage, First ; Membranes ; Pregnancy

BACKGROUND: Early detection and treatment of cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection is very important because CMN infection is a major cause of morbidity and mortality after organ transplantation. CMV antigenemia assay has been reported to be very sensitive and specific for detection of CMV infection among many laboratory methods. However, there is no single method correlated well with the infection state up to now. We compared the results of SHARP Signal System Assay (Digene, USA) using PCR and hybridization with those of CMV antigenemia assay (Clonab CMV-kit; Biotest AG, Germany) to evaluate their clinical usefulness. METHODS: We performed SHARP Signal Assay on whole blood samples of 125 from 56 transplanted patients submitted for CMV antigenemia at Samsung Medical Center. We compared the results with those of CMV antigenemia and evaluated the correlation with CMV disease state. RESULTS: Fifty six patients were classified as three groups; 43 patients with no evidence of CMV infection, four patients with CMV infection and 9 patients with CMV disease. Twenty four cases (19.2%) showed discrepant results between the two methods. Of the 22 cases showing positive only by SHARP Signal Assay, two cases were proved to be CMV disease, 12 cases were on antiviral treatment and remaining cases had no evidence of infection. Two cases showing positive only by CMV antigenemia were confirmed to be CMV disease. For CMV disease, the sensitivity of SHARP Signal Assay and CMV antigenemia were 85.7% and 90.5%, respectively and the specificity of them were 73.1% and 93.3%, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: CMV antigenemia is thought to be useful for early diagnosis and follow-up of antiviral treatment as a quantitative and highly specific method, and SHARP Signal Assay can be used as a complementary method because it correlates well with disease state.
Cytomegalovirus Infections* ; Cytomegalovirus* ; Diagnosis* ; Early Diagnosis ; Follow-Up Studies ; Humans ; Mortality ; Organ Transplantation ; Polymerase Chain Reaction* ; Sensitivity and Specificity ; Transplants

No abstract available.
Child* ; Humans

As cost pressures have escalated, policy makers, politicians, health care providers and families have tried to devise ways to reduce health care costs. While originally developed to enhance patient control and to provide better care at the end of life, hospice care has recently received significant attention as a mean of reducing health care costs. As a program providing care for patients who are dying at their homes, hospice has expanded slowly since the opening of the first hospice in Korea in 1963. Therefore, a variety of services that responds to the needs and concerns of many dying people and their families is limited The purpose of this study was to determine the potential cost savings at the end of life among patients who used home hospice compared with the patients who received institutional care in Korea. This study used a retrospective, descriptive design. The sample for this study included 46 patients who died of lung cancer: 25 patients who received home hospice care and 21 patients who received institutional care. Data on patient characteristics, kinds and frequencies of provided treatment and nursing services, and hospice and hospital charges during the last month before death were collected. Cost of care was measured by the average cost per patient per day in the last month of life. The results of the study indicated that there were significant differences in average cost of care between home hospice sample and institutional care sample (t=9.956, p<.001; home hospice sample: M=18,102 won, institutional care sample: M=317,578 won). The cost of the home hospice sample was approximately 6% of the cost of institutional care. The majority of the home hospice nursing services were education (35.7%) and supportive counseling (25.2%), followed by medication management (13.6%), assessment (12.1%), basic nursing (7.2%), treatment (5.5%) and others. In institutional care sample, basic nursing and treatment were more emphasized than education or supportive counseling among the nursing services provided. The results of this study showed the potential for hospice to reduce costs and implications for policymakers and clinicians to incorporate hospice program into the formal health care delivery system in Korea.
Administrative Personnel ; Cost Savings ; Counseling ; Delivery of Health Care ; Education ; Health Care Costs ; Health Personnel ; Hospice and Palliative Care Nursing ; Hospice Care* ; Hospices* ; Hospital Charges ; Humans ; Korea ; Lung Neoplasms ; Nursing Services* ; Nursing* ; Retrospective Studies ; Terminally Ill*

OBJECTIVES: To test the hypothesis that the endometrial stromal cells from patients with endometriosis responds differently to the insulin-like growth factor (IGF) compared with those from patients without endometriosis. METHODS: IGFs in peritoneal fluid (PF) from patients with endometriosis(n=18) and without endometriosis(n=12;control patients) were measured by radioimmunoassay. Endometrial stromal cells from patients with endometriosis and control patients were cultured in serum free media(SFM) in the presence or absence of PF or IGF-I(0.25-25 ng/ml) or IGF-II(5-50 ng/ml) and the proliferation of endometrial stromal cells were evaluated by [3H] thymidine incorporation test. All statistics were performed by ANOVA test and student's t-test. RESULTS: When added to SFM, IGF-I(1-25 ng/ml) increased thymidine incorporation in both endometrial stromal cells from patients with endometriosis and control patients in dose dependent manner and IGF-II(5-25 ng/ml) gave similar response in latter cells but not in former cells. Within low IGF-I(less than 100 ng/ml) PF group or high IGF-I(more than 100ng/ml) PF group, the type of endometrial stromal cells did not result in any difference in thymidine incorporation. However, regardless of the source of stromal cells, high IGF-I PF group produced a greater extent of thymidine incorporation than low IGF-I PF group in patients with endometriosis but not in control patients. Also, thymidine incorporation was higher in high IGF-I PF group of former patients than in the same group of latter patients. PF induced higher thymidine incorporation in endometrial stromal cells than the same levels(0.25-2.5 ng/ml) of IGF-I directly added to SFM. CONCLUSIONS: The effects of IGF-I in PF on endometrial stromal cells are similar regardless of their source and IGF-I is one of several growth factors that may participate in the growth of endometrial stromal cells in pelvic endometriosis.
Ascitic Fluid ; DNA ; Endometriosis* ; Female ; Humans ; Insulin-Like Growth Factor I ; Intercellular Signaling Peptides and Proteins ; Radioimmunoassay ; Somatomedins* ; Stromal Cells* ; Thymidine

No abstract available.
Leukemia, Myelogenous, Chronic, BCR-ABL Positive*

No abstract available.
Spinal Muscular Atrophies of Childhood*

A clinical study was made on 85 cases of prematurity under 37 weeks of gestational age who had history of blood transfusion during their admission at the National Medical Center from January 1989 to June 1992. The results were as follows: 1) Among 339 prematurity patients, 85 patients(25.1%) received blood transfusion once at least. 2) Male to female ratio was 1.13:1 and mean gestational age was 32.5 2.7weeks (range:25~36 weeks). 3) Most of blood transfusion(66/85 cases) were performed within first week of life. 4) 67 patients(78.8%) received blood transfusion 3 times or less. 5) Combined diseases were hyaline membrane disease(69.4%), jaundice(51.8%), sepsis(30.6%), PDA (14.1%), DIC (8.2%), pulmonary hemorrhage(7.1%), intraventricular hemorrhage (7.1%), pneumonia(7.1%) and hepatitis(4.7%). 6) Clinical manifestations at the time of blood transfusion were pallor (47.1%), decreased activity (44.7%), bradycardia (23.5%),apnea (21.2%), tachypnea (20.0%), lethargy (4.7%), poor weight gain (3.5%) and tachycardia (3.5%). 7) The values of hematocrit were significantly increased after transfusion(42.4 +/-7.2 vs 34.6 +/- 6.8vol%). 8) The episodes of bradycardia were significantly decreased after blood transfusion(0.09 +/- 0.39 vs 0.23+/- 0.78)while the episodes of apnea were not (0.15 +/-0.71 vs 0.27+/- 0.84).
Apnea ; Blood Transfusion* ; Bradycardia ; Dacarbazine ; Female ; Gestational Age ; Hematocrit ; Hemorrhage ; Humans ; Hyalin ; Lethargy ; Male ; Membranes ; Pallor ; Tachycardia ; Tachypnea ; Weight Gain