Postoperative brain damage is one of most serious complications of cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB). To prevent brain damage during CPB, adequate cerebral perfusion for cerebral oxygen demand should be maintained. This study monitored jugular venous oxyhemoglobin saturation (SjO₂), which reflects the overall balance of cerebral oxygen supply and demand, intermittently in 10 patients undergoing cardiac surgery. At the initiation of CPB, in spite of a significant decrease in mean arterial pressure, SjO₂ did not change, and it was stable during the hypothermic period of CPB. But a significan reduction in SjO₂ was observed during the rewarming period, and SjO₂ had an inverse linear correlation with esophageal temperature. Furthermore, the percent decrease of SjO₂ was related to rewarming speed. Therefore, therapeutic approaches for SjO₂ desaturation include slower rewarming, increasing cerebral blood flow, decreasing the cerebral metabolic rate for oxygen, increasing oxygen content, and increasing perfusion flow rate.
Arterial Pressure ; Brain ; Cardiopulmonary Bypass ; Cerebrovascular Circulation ; Humans ; Oxygen ; Oxyhemoglobins* ; Perfusion ; Rewarming ; Thoracic Surgery

No abstract available.
Lymphadenitis*

E-cadherin (ECD) is a Ca++ -dependent adhesion molecule which plays a major role in the maintenance of intercellular adhesion in epithelial tissues. The expression pattern of ECD in 77 surgically resected gastric adenocarcinomas was examined by immunohistochemistry, using a rat monoclonal antibody raised against murine E-cadherin (DECAM-1). ECD was strongly expressed uniformly at cell to cell borders in normal gastric epithelium without exception. But, various staining patterns were observed in the cancer tissues. The frequency of tumors with preserved ECD expression (Pre-type) and reduced ECD expression (Rd-type) was 44% and 56%, respectively. Using Lauren's classification, the high frequency of the Pre-type expression in adenocarcinoma of the intestinal type was significantly higher than that in adenocarcinoma of the diffuse type (p<0.05). But, no significant correlation between the ECD expression and the gross type, invasion depth, growth pattern or metastasis was observed. These results suggest that ECD might play a key role in the morphogenesis of gastric adenocarcinoma.
Adenocarcinoma* ; Animals ; Cadherins* ; Classification ; Epithelium ; Immunohistochemistry ; Morphogenesis ; Neoplasm Metastasis ; Rats

No abstract available.
Arthritis, Rheumatoid* ; Humans ; Hyperplasia* ; NF-kappa B*

BACKGROUND: Nosocomial urinary tract infection (UTI) accounts for 35% of the nosocomial infection and 80-90% of them are associated with urethral catheters. Recently, we experienced an outbreak of nosocomial UTI caused by multidrug-resistant Pseudomonas aeruginosa in neurosurgical intensive care unit (NSICU). METHODS: We investigated clinical records of the patients and observed the methods of care of urethral catheters in NSICU. Identification of P. aeruginose was done by API NE (API system; bioMerieux, France) and antibiotic susceptibility tests were done by disk diffusion method. Random Amplification of Polymorphic DNA (RAPD) assay was used as a genotyping method. RESULTS: Between November 1997 and January 1998, 11 P. aeruginosa strains were isolated from the urine of 11 patients hospitalized in NSICU of Kangnam St. Mary's Hospital. Routine regular bladder irrigation, and emptying urine with common urinal had been done falsely. Antibiogram of the isolates showed resistance to multiple antibiotics including imipenem, gentamicin. amikacin, piperacillin, ciprofloxacin, ceftazidime, and cefoperazone/sulbactam. RAPD of the outbreak strains showed clonal relatedness, which was different from those of other clinical strains, We instructed all the health care workers to stop bladder Irrigation, and to use the separate urinals for each patient. Thereafter, no further case of P. aeruginosa UTI has occurred. CONCLUSION: An outbreak of UTI, caused by a single clone of P. aeruginosa, was confirmed by RAPD and was eradicated after correction of false practice on care-of urinary catheter.
Amikacin ; Anti-Bacterial Agents ; Ceftazidime ; Ciprofloxacin ; Clone Cells ; Cross Infection ; Delivery of Health Care ; Diffusion ; DNA ; Drug Resistance, Multiple ; Gentamicins ; Humans ; Imipenem ; Intensive Care Units ; Microbial Sensitivity Tests ; Piperacillin ; Pseudomonas aeruginosa* ; Pseudomonas* ; Urinary Bladder ; Urinary Catheters ; Urinary Tract Infections* ; Urinary Tract*

No abstract available.
Female ; Hydatidiform Mole* ; Pregnancy

No abstract available.
Female ; Gestational Age* ; Humans ; Membranes* ; Pregnant Women* ; Rupture*

No abstract available.
Blood Group Incompatibility* ; Bromelains*

BACKGROUND: An accurate and rapid method for specise identification of coagulase negative staphylococci(CNS) has been increasingly necessary for the clinical significance and planning the management of patients with staphylococcal infections. Recently, it has been reported that there is a highly conserved area on their 60KDa heat shock protein(HSP60) gene sequences between the interspecies of CNS and it can be amplified by a set of universal degenerate primer. This led us our attention to focus on whether the PCR-based RFLP method using Mse / restriction enzyme could be a useful tool for the species identification of CNS. METHODS: In the present study, we performed PCR-based RFLP analysis using a set of degenerate primers covering HSP60 and Mse / restriction enzyme on the reference strains and 25 clinical isolates(10 of S. epidermidis, 10 of S. haemolyticus, 4 of S. lugdunensis and 1 of S. warneri) which were previously identified by the API-STAPH, Vitek GPI card and/or with conventional biochemical test. RESULT: All the seven reference strains revealed that each strain has a distinct electrophoresed band patterns with combination of different number (up to 8) and size of fragments. And these distinct band patterns showed remarkable concordance with the seven reference strains and 25 clinical isolates. CONCLUSION: These result strongly suggest that the PCR-RFLP method using degenerate primers covering the HSP60 gene and Mse / digestion enzyme offer a convenient and accurate tool for species-specific identification of CNS.
Chaperonin 60* ; Coagulase* ; Digestion ; Heat-Shock Proteins* ; Hot Temperature* ; Humans ; Polymerase Chain Reaction ; Polymorphism, Restriction Fragment Length ; Shock ; Staphylococcal Infections

Lymphoid tumors of the orbit are rare, and sometimes it is not possible either clinically or histologically to differentiate between lymphoid tumor and pseudolymphoma. Some authors assert that the degree of cytologic differentiation appears to be the single most important factor for determining the prognosis of patients with orbital lymphoid lesions. However, the cytomorphologic basis is not so helpful to diagnose and classify our case, which shows some discrepancy between pathological findings and clinical and radiological findings. At first we misdiagnosed our case as orbital malignant lymphoma on the basis of cytomorphology and immunohistochemical study. But no responce to local intensive radiotherapy and the follow up study of the patient suggest orbital pseudolymphoma.
Follow-Up Studies