No abstract available.
Thrombasthenia*

No abstract available.
Family Practice* ; Humans ; Primary Health Care*

BACKGROUND: Flecainide is an antiarrhythmic agent that is used primarily in the treatment of cardiac arrhythmias. Some evidences also suggest that flecainide can participate in alveolar fluid clearance and inflammatory responses. This experiment was aimed to evaluate the effects of flecainide on sepsis induced acute lung injury in a rat model. METHODS: Rats were treated with subcutaneous infusion of saline or flecainide (0.1 or 0.2 mg/kg/hr) by a mini-osmotic pump. Subcutaneous infusion was started 3 hours before and continued until 8 hours after intraperitoneal injection of saline or endotoxin. Animals were sacrificed for analyses of severity of acute lung injury with wet to dry (W/D) ratio and lung injury score (LIS) in lung and inflammatory responses with level of leukocyte, polymorphonuclear neutrophils (PMNs) and inteleukin-8 (IL-8) in bronchoalveolar lavages fluid (BALF). RESULTS: Flecainide markedly improved dose dependently sepsis induced acute lung injury as analysed by W/D ratio (from 2.24 ± 0.11 to 1.76 ± 0.09, p < 0.05) and LIS (from 3 to 1, p < 0.05), and inflammatory response as determined by leukocyte (from 443 ± 127 to 229 ± 95, p < 0.05), PMNs (from 41.43 ± 17.63 to 2.43 ± 2.61, p < 0.05) and IL-8 (from 95.00 ± 15.28 to 40.00 ± 10.21, p < 0.05) in BALF. CONCLUSIONS: Flecanide improve sepsis induced acute lung injury in rats by controlling inflammatory responses.
Acute Lung Injury* ; Animals ; Arrhythmias, Cardiac ; Bronchoalveolar Lavage ; Flecainide* ; Infusions, Subcutaneous ; Injections, Intraperitoneal ; Interleukin-8 ; Leukocytes ; Lung ; Lung Injury ; Models, Animal ; Neutrophils ; Rats ; Sepsis*

We studied the ultrastructural alteration of glomerular anionic sites in 6 patients with minimal change nephrotic syndrome, 5 patients with membranous glomerulonephritis, 4 patients with focal segmental glomerulosclerosis, and 4 patients with IgA nephropathy by staining with polyethyleneimine (PEI) as a cationic probe. The control study was examined by using a nephrectomy specimen of non-glomerular disease which had no proteinuria. This method seems to selectively stain heparan sulphate in the basement membranes and has been widely used to evaluate changes in basement membrane charge in various human diseases as well as in experimental studies. The anionic sites in the lamina rara interna and lamina densa of normal glomerular basement membrane were always less numerous and less regularly distributed than those in the lamina rara externa. Characteristic common findings in these glomeruli showed a marked decrease of glomerular anionic sites in the regions with immune-complex deposits and normal distribution in the regions with focally those being absorbed and newly forming glomerular basement membrane. They were not detected in the gap of the basement membrane and on the area of the detached overlying epithelium using the PEI method. But the foot process fusion of epithelial cells seems not to influence the loss of anionic sites on the glomerular basement membrane.
Basement Membrane ; Epithelial Cells ; Epithelium ; Foot ; Glomerular Basement Membrane* ; Glomerulonephritis, IGA ; Glomerulonephritis, Membranous ; Glomerulosclerosis, Focal Segmental ; Humans ; Nephrectomy ; Nephrosis, Lipoid ; Polyethyleneimine ; Proteinuria

No abstract available.
Mucocele*

Anti–glomerular basement membrane (GBM) nephritis is characterized by circulating anti-GBM antibodies and crescentic glomerulonephritis (GN) with deposition of IgG along the GBM. In a limited number of cases, glomerular immune complexes have been identified in anti-GBM nephritis. A 38-year-old female presented azotemia, hematuria, and proteinuria without any pulmonary symptoms. A renal biopsy showed crescentic GN with linear IgG deposition along the GBM and mesangial IgA deposition. The patient was diagnosed as concurrent anti-GBM nephritis and IgA nephropathy. Therapies with pulse methylprednisolone and cyclophosphamide administration were effective. Concurrent cases of both anti-GBM nephritis and IgA nephropathy are rare among cases of anti-GBM diseases with deposition of immune complexes. This rare case of concurrent anti-GBM nephritis and IgA nephropathy with literature review is noteworthy.
Adult ; Anti-Glomerular Basement Membrane Disease ; Antibodies ; Antigen-Antibody Complex ; Azotemia ; Basement Membrane ; Biopsy ; Cyclophosphamide ; Female ; Glomerulonephritis ; Glomerulonephritis, IGA ; Hematuria ; Humans ; Immunoglobulin A ; Immunoglobulin G ; Methylprednisolone ; Nephritis ; Proteinuria

BACKGROUND: There is a recent trend of increased use of the gel test for the detection of unexpected antibodies (Abs) because of its simplicity and ease with which definitive interpretation can be made. However, because of the low insurance payments in Korea, only the LISS/Coombs card is used and thus the detection rate of the cold Abs has decreased. We have studied the detection rates of the Abs in patients by using the LISS/Coombs gel test and thus evaluated the clinical usefulness of the LISS/Coombs gel test. METHODS: Abs screening tests have been carried out using the DiaMed(TM) LISS/Coombs gel card test (Murten, Switzerland) on 14,942 patients for whom blood transfusions were ordered between July 1, 1997 and March 31, 2001. When the test for Abs was positive, Ab identification tests were further carried out with the DiaMed(TM) LISS/Coombs gel card and the ID-DiaPanel 1-11. RESULTS: Eighty-one out of 14,942 patients (0.54%) revealed positive results. Of these, 15 showed anti-E, 5 showed anti-E+c, 4 showed anti-C, 3 showed anti-D, 2 showed anti-Jk(a), 1 each showed anti-c, anti-M, anti-Lu(a), and anti-K Abs. CONCLUSIONS: Although the detection rate for the cold Abs of the LISS/Coombs gel test was low, it is considered to be highly useful because of the high detection rate for the clinically important warm Abs, the simplicity in carrying out the test, and the easy readability of test results.
Antibodies ; Blood Transfusion ; Comprehension ; Humans ; Insurance ; Korea ; Mass Screening

BACKGROUND: Endothelin-1 has been found to be a potent mitogen in cultured mesangial cells. In addition, the urinary hyperexcretion of endothelin-1 was observed in patients with glomerulonephritis. METHODS: The author studied endothelin-1 immunoreactivity in 64 kidney biopsies of patients with various glomerular diseases by immunoperoxidase staining utilizing anti-endothelin-1 serum from the rabbit. RESULTS: A group of Ig A nephropathy with glomerular proliferative change (8 focal glomerulonephritis and 7 diffuse mesangial proliferative glemerulonephritis) and a group of other proliferative glomerulonephritis (11 membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis type I, 5 poststreptococcal glomerulonephritis, 8 focal or diffuse proliferative lupus nephritis) have more prominent endothelin-1 protein expression in the glomerular endothelium, the vascular endothelium and the tubular epithelium than non-proliferative glomerular disease group (12 minimal change nephrotic syndrome, 7 membranous nephropathies, 6 IgA nephropathies with minor glomerular abnormality). CONCLUSION: These results suggest that endothelin-1 has a potential role in the pathophysiology of proliferative glomerualr diseases.
Biopsy ; Endothelin-1* ; Endothelium ; Endothelium, Vascular ; Epithelium ; Glomerulonephritis* ; Glomerulonephritis, Membranoproliferative ; Humans ; Immunoglobulin A ; Kidney* ; Mesangial Cells ; Nephrosis, Lipoid

BACKGROUND: JC virus (JCV) is a polyomavirus that commonly infects humans and can cause progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy in immunocompromised patients. Recently, many reports have documented detection of JCV in gastrointestinal tract cancers. We investigated the presence of JCV in gastric adenocarcinoma, adenoma, and non-neoplastic gastric mucosa. METHODS: We selected paraffin-embedded tissue from endoscopic mucosal resections performed from January 2007 to September 2008. DNA was extracted from the paraffin-embedded specimens of 30 adenocarcinomas, 20 adenomas of the stomach, and 20 non-neoplastic gastric mucosa. Polymerase chain reaction amplifications were performed using gene-specific primers to detect the JCV gene sequences, and immunohistochemical staining was performed to detect the T-antigen (T-Ag) protein. RESULTS: The T-Ag sequence was detected in nine of 30 gastric cancers (30%), two of 20 adenomas (10%), and eight of 20 non-neoplastic gastric mucosa specimens (40%). T-Ag protein expression was found in five of 30 gastric cancers (16.7%) and one of 20 non-neoplastic gastric mucosa specimens (5%), whereas no expression was observed in any of the adenomas. CONCLUSIONS: Although we could not detect a correlation between JCV and gastric cancer, we demonstrated the presence of JCV T-Ag expression in human gastric cancers. These findings suggest a possible role for JCV in gastric carcinogenesis.
Adenocarcinoma ; Adenoma ; Antigens, Viral, Tumor ; DNA ; Gastric Mucosa ; Gastrointestinal Neoplasms ; Humans ; Immunocompromised Host ; JC Virus ; Leukoencephalopathy, Progressive Multifocal ; Polymerase Chain Reaction ; Polyomavirus ; Stomach ; Stomach Neoplasms