Intermittent exotropia at times is completely controlled by the convergence mechanisms and at other times escapes this control and becomes a manifest exotropia. The treatment of choice is surgical and the treatment is directed at normalization of binocular functions, and recurrence and overcorrection are frequently seen after surgery. Therefore it is important to decide the time and the type of surgery. The author experienced 66 cases of intermittent exotropia in which surgery was done. Surgery was indicated in the cases with deviation of 20 PD or more, deviation of less than 20 PD with asthenopia, exotropia occurred during more than 40% of waking hours, and deterioration of stereoacuity even at early age. Bilateral recession was initial procedure regardless type of intermittent exotropia. In the case with amblyopia, however, R and R was done on the amblyopic eye and in convergence insufficiency type bimedial resection. Lateral Incomitancy was present in 37.9%. The basic type which was shown in 68.2% was the most frequent one. The amount of esodeviation was 15 to 10 PD in 43.9% and 11 to 15 PD in 21.2% on the first postoperative day. The phoria within 10 PD was shown in 95.4% 6 weeks after surgery, in 98.5% 3 months after surgery, and in 93.9% 6 months after surgery. Six months after surgery, 4 cases revealed exodeviation above 16 PD and no case esodeviation. Stereopsis was tested in 54 cases who understood the test before operation and 43 cases(79.6%) showed stereopsis. Nine out of 11 cases who had no stereopsis showed stereopsis after operation. In this study, success rate of first surgery was as high as 93.9% in 6 months follow-up and stereopsis was restored in considerable number of cases in intermittent exotropia compared to other types of strabismus and binocular function could also be restored and improved after surgery.
Amblyopia ; Asthenopia ; Depth Perception ; Esotropia ; Exotropia* ; Follow-Up Studies ; Ocular Motility Disorders ; Recurrence ; Strabismus ; Telescopes ; United Nations

No abstract available.
Radiation, Ionizing

Anisometropia is caused by axial ametropia and refractive ametropia. Almost all anisometropia in children are known to be caused by axial ametropia. Axial ametropic anisometropia is corrected by the spectacles by Knapp's rule. We experienced 41 patients with anisometropia, in whom the relationship between the difference in axial length in each eye(x) and the difference in refractive error in each eye(y) was linear, y = -0.00758+2.18554x. According to this approximate regression formula, 27 patients(66%) showed axial ametropic anisometropia and 14 patients(34%) showed refractive ametropic anisometropia. Twenty three(85%) out of 27 patients had had amalyopia. Ten patients(83%) at the age of 9 or less improved their visual acuity after amblyopia treatment, but only 4 patients(36%) older than 9 showed mild improvement. In authors' experience, axial ametropic anisometropia can be corrected by spectacles with full amount of refractive error and by proper amblyopia treatment. It is important to diagnose and treat the axial ametropic anisometropia in early childhood, however even in the patients older than 9 years old the visual prognosis is not so hopeless if treated with fully corrected spectacles and proper amblyopia treatment.
Amblyopia ; Anisometropia ; Child ; Eyeglasses ; Humans ; Prognosis ; Refractive Errors ; Visual Acuity

The recent prevalence of syphilis has known to be increased progressively throughout the world, since middle of 1950. In Korea, current trend of increased syphilic infection has became a major public health problem. The authors selected sero-positive patients, among the outpaients of department of dermatology, urology, OB & GY, and physical examination, and performed statistical analysis of this sero-positive patients. Results are as following; 1) Of the 2,007 patients taken physical examination, 30 patient(1.49%) were reactive to VDRL. 2) 0.71% of the total out patients of the dermatologic dcpartment were sero-positive. Annual ratio of the syphilitic patient were increased progressively. 3) Ratio of the syphilitic patients to the total outpatients of OB & GY department was 0.55% and somewhat increased since 1976. 4) In the age distribution, the third decade shared 51.8% of the total sero-positive patients 5) In the sexual ratio. male:female=l: l. 62 in the total sero-positive patients. (male:female=l: 1.06 in the dermatologic department.) 6) In the stage distribution, latent syphilis patients were 59.14% of the total syphilitic patients.
Age Distribution ; Dermatology ; Female ; Humans ; Korea ; Outpatients ; Physical Examination ; Prevalence ; Public Health ; Syphilis ; Syphilis, Latent ; Urology

Cytogenetic dosimetry is useful for evaluating the absorbed dose of ionizing radiation based on analysis of radiation-induced chromosomal aberrations. We created two types of in vitro dose-response calibration curves for dicentric chromosomes (DC) and translocations (TR) induced by X-ray irradiation, using an electron linear accelerator, which is the most frequently used medical device in radiotherapy. We irradiated samples from four healthy Korean individuals and compared the resultant curves between individuals. Aberration yields were studied in a total of 31,800 and 31,725 metaphases for DC and TR, respectively, obtained from 11 X-ray irradiation dose-points (0, 0.05, 0.1, 0.25, 0.5, 0.75, 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 Gy). The dose-response relationship followed a linear-quadratic equation, Y=C+αD+βD², with the coefficients C=0.0011 for DC and 0.0015 for TR, α=0.0119 for DC and 0.0048 for TR, and β=0.0617 for DC and 0.0237 for TR. Correlation coefficients between irradiation doses and chromosomal aberrations were 0.971 for DC and 0.6 for TR, indicating a very strong and a moderate correlation, respectively. This is the first study implementing cytogenetic dosimetry following exposure to ionizing X-radiation.
Calibration ; Chromosome Aberrations ; Cytogenetics ; In Vitro Techniques* ; Particle Accelerators ; Radiation, Ionizing ; Radiotherapy

Drug-induced interstitial nephritis is one of the causes of acute kidney injury. Although methomyl is widely used as an insecticide in many countries, methomyl-induced interstitial nephritis has not been reported thus far in the general population. We report a case of a 39-year-old male patient with acute allergic tubulointerstitial nephritis due to methomyl intoxication. He took methomyl 250 mL to commit suicide. He was treated with hemodialysis, but his renal function continued to deteriorate. Kidney biopsy demonstrated mononuclear cell and some eosinophils infiltration into the renal interstitium with tubular invasion. Immediate steroid pulse therapy, appropriate education, and conservative management resulted in gradual restoration of his renal function. This case suggests that methomyl may be a causative allergen inducing acute interstitial nephritis in some patients.
Acute Kidney Injury ; Adult ; Biopsy ; Education ; Eosinophils ; Humans ; Kidney ; Male ; Methomyl ; Nephritis ; Nephritis, Interstitial* ; Renal Dialysis ; Suicide

PURPOSE: The progressivity of central precocious puberty (CPP) seems to depend on the age at presentation. We evaluated the clinical courses of CPP girls according to their age at initiation of treatment. METHODS: One hundred thirty five girls with CPP diagnosed between Jan. 2003 and Dec. 2009 and regularly followed for more than one year were included. They were treated with gonadotropin-releasing hormone agonists (GnRHa) every four weeks. Subjects were divided into two groups based on whether they were treated before (Group I, N=20) or after seven years of age (Group II, N=115). We compared the anthropometric parameters, the predicted adult height (PAH), predicted treatment periods, and the laboratory findings of the two groups every six months. RESULTS: Out of 135 CPP patients, 123 were idiopathic and twelve had neurogenic problems. At the baseline, patients' average bone age (BA) was significantly older than chronologic age (CA) and PAH was significantly shorter than target height (TH). BA and CA were significantly older in group II, but the BA/CA ratio was significantly greater in group I. The average treatment period required to overcome the CA-BA difference was 4.64 yr (group I vs II; 7.98 yr vs 4.24 yr, P < 0.01), and the period needed to overcome PAH-TH difference was 2.49 yr (group I vs II; 4.37 yr vs 2.32 yr, P < 0.01). CONCLUSION: Among the girls with CPP, the younger age group had more advanced BA than CA, and needed significantly longer treatment periods to overcome the BA-CA gap and PAH-TH gaps.
Adult ; Gonadotropin-Releasing Hormone ; Humans ; Piperazines ; Puberty, Precocious

BACKGROUND: The prevalence of dementia is estimated to be as high as 5 10% over 65 years of age in Korea. It is important to evaluate of dementia for the elderly, because of the chronicity and progressiveness of the disease. However, cognitive impairment often goes unrecognized by physician because the many previous tools to evaluate cognitive function in the clinical setting are complex, time consuming and sometimes questionable correlation with real world functioning. The purpose of this study is to assess the usefulness of The Time and Change test as screening test for dementia ,on the basis of the correlation between this measure(T&C) and MMSE K. METHODS: The subject for this study consisted of 64 elderly who visited to the outpatient department of family medicine of the Ehwa Mok dong hospital or Elderly Welfare Center in Seoul. They received the T&C test and MMSE K examination. Sensitivity, specificity, negative predictive value, and Pearson' Correlation coefficient were calculated using standard formulas. RESULTS: The T&C had a sensitivity of 50%, a specificity of 88 %, a positive predictive value of 69%, a negative predictive value of 77 %, respectably. when timed cutpoints were added, The T&C test had a sensitivity of 95%, specificity of 83 %, a positive predictive value of 75%, a negative predictive value of 97 %. respectibaly. CONCLUSION: The Time and Change(T&C) tests can be an effective, simple and performance based tool to recognize dementia. Further validation with a representative elderly sample is needed to establish screening value in primary care or community populations.
Aged* ; Dementia ; Humans ; Korea ; Mass Screening* ; Outpatients ; Prevalence ; Primary Health Care ; Sensitivity and Specificity ; Seoul

Capsaicin, the pungent component of chilli peppers, is known to induce mediators of hematopoiesis. We investigated the effect of capsaicin on hematopoiesis in mouse progenitor cells. Treatment of mouse bone marrow cells with capsaicin induced the formation of colony of burst-forming units-erythroid (BFU-E). We also found that the number of erythropoietin receptor (EpoR)-positive cells was increased by capsaicin. To clarify the effect of capsaicin on erythroid lineage, BFU-E colonies were separated from non-BFU-E colonies by colony-picking after in vitro culture of mouse bone marrow cells. Quantitative RT-PCR analysis revealed that capsaicin stimulated the expression of the erythroid-specific genes encoding EpoR, glycophorin A (GPA), beta-globin (Hbb-b1), GATA-1, PU.1, nuclear factor erythroid-derived 2 (NF-E2), and Kruppel-like factor 1 (KLF1) in the BFU-E colonies. Furthermore, capsaicin could effectively stimulate the transfected GATA-1 promoter in K562 cells. GATA-1 is known as an essential transcription factor for the development of erythroid cells. Our results show that development of the erythroid lineage from bone marrow cells can be induced by treatment with capsaicin, and that GATA-1 seems to play a role in this induced erythroid maturation.
Animals ; Bone Marrow Cells/*cytology/drug effects/metabolism ; Capsaicin/*pharmacology ; Cell Lineage ; Cells, Cultured ; Colony-Forming Units Assay ; Erythroid Cells/*cytology ; GATA1 Transcription Factor/genetics/metabolism ; Hematopoiesis ; Hematopoietic Stem Cells/*cytology/drug effects/metabolism ; Male ; Mice ; Mice, Inbred C57BL ; Promoter Regions, Genetic ; Receptors, Erythropoietin/metabolism

Androgen insensitivity syndrome is a genetic syndrome characterized by complete or partial resistance of end organs to the peripheral effect of androgen. The phenotype of this condition is female, despite the normal male karyotype 46,XY. This is the third most common cause of primary amenorrhea after gonadal dysgenesis and mullerian agenesis. There is a congenital insensitivity to androgens, transmitted by means of a maternal X-linked recessive gene responsible for the androgen intracellular receptor. Prophylactic gonadectomy in usually performed due to increased risk for development of malignancy and possible virilization. Pelviscopy provides a minimally invasive technique for the accurate diagnosis and also provides the opportunity for therapeutic management of these patients. Recently we experienced two cases of this syndrome and removed the gonad by pelviscopic surgery, so we presented them with brief review of literature.
Amenorrhea ; Androgen-Insensitivity Syndrome* ; Androgens ; Diagnosis ; Female ; Genes, Recessive ; Gonadal Dysgenesis ; Gonads ; Humans ; Karyotype ; Male ; Phenotype ; Virilism