No abstract available.
Chitosan*

Optic nerve sheath meningioma arises from the arachnoid cap cell of optic nerve sheath and comprises most of primary orbital meningioma. We experienced a rare case of optic nerve sheath meningioma originating in the left orbit. A 44-year-old woman had suffered from visual disturbance in the left eye for 3 years and had only light perceptibility for the recent 6 months. The right eye was normal. Brain CT scan and MRI revealed a 2x0.8 cm sized fusiform solid mass in the left retrobulbar area. Under the impression of optic nerve tumor. excision of the mass including a small segment of the optic nerve was performed. The tumor was a yellowish firm, relatively well demarcated mass that encircled the optic nerve without infiltrating it. Microscopically it was a typical meningioma, meningothelial type. The recovery of visual acuity was impossible due to resection of optic nerve but there was no evidence of recurrence for u months.
Female ; Humans ; Meningioma

No abstract available.
Animals ; Chitosan* ; Eating* ; Mice*

OBJECTIVES: Anticardiolipin antibody (ACA) and lupus anticoagulant (LA) are acquired antiphospholipid antibodies (APAs), which are regarded as important risk factors far vascular thrombosis and recurrent fetal loss. Although the clinical relevance of APAs in dialysis patients is uncertain, recent studies have suggested that APAs are involved in bioincompatibility and thrombogenic complications in hemadialysis (HD) patients. METHOD: We performed a cross sectional study of ACA and LA in 50 stable HD patients and their 68 vascular accesses (52 native arteriovenous fistulae and 16 synthetic arterovenous grafts), with the analysis of factors associated with the presence of APAs and the retrospective evaluation of vascular access occlusion (VAO). LA was assessed by platelet neutralization method whereas IgG-ACA was measured by a solid phase ELISA. Values higher than 23GPLU/ml (IgG phospholipid units) were considered to be positive for IgG-ACA and positive values for LA was more than 8 seconds in prolongation of the clotting time with human platelet lysate. Vascular access survival was assessed by Kaplan- Meier method, RESULTS: The mean age of the subject (M:F 21:29) was 46 years and the mean duration of hemodialysis was 49 months. The frequency of VAO in entire subjects was 0.45+/-0.98 episodes/patient year. The median value of IgG-ACA was 16.0 GPLU/ml with a distribution from 2.7 to 46.1GPLU/ ml. The median titer of I.A was 4.5 (3.1-45.6) seconds. Fourteen patients (28%) were found to have at least one episode of VAO. In spite of comparable clinical and biochemical data according to the presence of VAO, the titers of IgG-ACA (13.6+/-7.7 vs, 20.3+/-8.7GPLIJ/ml, P<0.05) and LA (4.5+/-2.9 vs. 11.7 +/-12.6sec, P<0.05) were significantly higher in VAO group. Six out of 50 patients(12%) had an increased titer of IgG-ACA and LA was found in 11 patients(22%). No patients were positive for ACA and LA simultaneously. There was no significant difference in sex, etiology of ESRD, diabetic status, the dosage of heparin during HD or the amount of erythropoietin administered according to the presence of APAs. We could not find any significant correlation between the titer of APAs and age, duration of dialysis, blood pressure, platelet count and biochemical parameters. In the patients with positive ACA, the frequency of VAO was 1.05+/-0.12 episodes/patient year, which was significantly higher than patients without ACA (0.33+/-0.17 episodes/ patient year, P<0.05). In the patients with the presence of LA(1.06+/-0.43 vs. 0.12+/-0.06 episodes/ patients year, P<0.01). The median vascular access survival time in IgG-ACA positive patients (32.7 months) was significantly decreased compared to 66.8 months in IgG-ACA negative group. CONCLUSION: Our data suggest that the presence of APAs (ACA and/or LA) affects the event-free vascular access survival in HD patients. Therefore the evaluation of APAs status have to be included in the diagnostic strategies for the patients with recurrent VAO. Further studies are necessary to explore the pharmacologic intervention method to decrease APAs and prevent VAO in HD patients.
Antibodies, Anticardiolipin* ; Antibodies, Antiphospholipid ; Arteriovenous Fistula ; Blood Platelets ; Blood Pressure ; Dialysis ; Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay ; Erythropoietin ; Heparin ; Humans ; Kidney Failure, Chronic ; Lupus Coagulation Inhibitor* ; Platelet Count ; Renal Dialysis* ; Retrospective Studies ; Risk Factors ; Thrombosis

No abstract available.
Humans ; Lymphocytes* ; Siblings* ; Sister Chromatid Exchange* ; Thyroid Gland* ; Thyroid Neoplasms*

BACKGROUND: A medulloblastoma is a primitive neuroepithelial tumor of the cerebellum that occurs in children and metastasizes through the cerebrospinal fluid. It is highly malignant and invasive, and the 5-year survival rate is only 60%. Surgical resection techniques, radiation, and chemotherapy have improved the overall survival but the patients suffer life-long cognitive dysfunctions or endocrine abnormalities as the side effects of treatment. Therefore it is essential to identify prognostic markers to determine the appropriate treatment strategy in order to minimize the side effects. METHODS: This study evaluated the immunohistochemical differentiation and survival rate with synaptophysin, glial fibrillary acidic protein, epithelial membrane antigen, vimentin and primitive neuroepithelial marker nestin of 55 paraffin-embedded medulloblastomas, using a tissue microarray. The expression of survivin, the apoptotic inhibitor, and the survival rate with regard to the proliferation index of Ki-67 were also investigated. RESULTS: The group testing positive to vimentin, a mesenchymal differentiation marker, had a worse prognosis and there was a strong correlation between vimentin expression and nestin expression. Patients with a survivin expression rate >35% had a significantly poorer clinical course and there was a correlation between the survivin expression rate and Ki-67 expression rate. CONCLUSION: In conclusion, vimentin and survivin are negative prognostic markers in medulloblastomas.
Cerebellum ; Cerebrospinal Fluid ; Child ; Drug Therapy ; Glial Fibrillary Acidic Protein ; Humans ; Medulloblastoma* ; Mucin-1 ; Nestin ; Neuroectodermal Tumors, Primitive ; Prognosis ; Survival Rate ; Synaptophysin ; Vimentin*

Pigmented lesions of palmar and plantar skin may cause diagnostic problems, because some features of benign lesions in these sites may raise the suspicion of melanoma if considered alone. Transepidermal elimlnation is a mechanism by which a substance is eliminated through the epidermis, and it is apt to be confused with a feature of melanoma that tumor cells are located at all layers of the epidermis. We report a case of transepidermal elimination of nevus cells in acral letiginous nevus which needs a differential dignosis of melanoma.
Epidermis ; Melanoma ; Nevus* ; Skin

No abstract available.
Pylorus*

OBJECTIVE: A reference terminology is essential to achieve semantic interoperability and enhance the quality of health care. Reference terminologies that have achieved common acceptance contain many concepts that clinicians would not want in healthcare, which preclude their practical use in documentation of patient information. To solve the problems, this document proposes a reference terminology model which contains concepts that physicians can use satisfactorily. METHODS: We analyzed the structures of the UMLS and SNOMED CT. We also analyzed health care terms which had been collected by the Korea National Health Information Standard Committee. Based on the results of the analysis, we developed an object-oriented reference terminology model. And, we designed database schema with the model. RESULTS: Eight components of the UMLS and six components of the SNOMED CT were analyzed. The collected terms had various properties and mapping vocabularies according to the characteristics of their respective domains. A reference terminology model was developed from a three-level view using UML. A database schema was developed using ERD. CONCLUSION: This study mainly focuses on reference terminology modeling. It is hoped that this reference terminology modeling helps the semantic interoperable exchange of clinical documents as the basis of common EMR.
Delivery of Health Care* ; Hope ; Humans ; Korea ; Quality of Health Care ; Semantics ; Systematized Nomenclature of Medicine ; Unified Medical Language System ; Vocabulary

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to develop in vivo dosimetries using both chromosomal aberrations and micronuclei in mice to assess biological effects of radiations. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Five each mice were irradiated with 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10 Gy of Cs-137 gamma-rays. We scored numbers of chromosomal aberrations in metaphase spreads and numbers of micronuclei in bone marrow smears under light microscope, and obtained the dose-response relationships. We also examined the relationship between the two dose-response curves. RESULTS: The frequency of both chromosomal aberrations and micronuclei increased with dose, in a linear-quadratic manner. The delta, beta, and alpha coefficients were 0.0176, 0.0324, and 0.0567 for metaphase analysis (r=1.0, p<0.001) and 0.0019, 0.0073, and 0.0506 for micronuclei assay (r=1.0, p<0.001). The frequency of chromosomal aberrations and micronuclei in diffirent radiation doses was significantly correlated (r=0.99, p<0.01). CONCLUSION: In vivo dosimetry using either metaphase analysis or micronucleus assay was feasible in mice. These methods could be useful to evaluate biological effects of radiation.
Animals ; Bone Marrow Cells* ; Bone Marrow* ; Chromosome Aberrations ; Metaphase* ; Mice* ; Micronucleus Tests