Atypical laryngeal carcinoid is a rare tumor with a poor prognosis, mostly occurring in the supraglottic larynx. It is a subtype of neuroendocrine carcinoma which should be separated from typical carcinoid and small cell carcinoma. The histogenesis and standardized classification of laryngeal neuroendocrine carcinoma have not been clearly defined. In this report, we present two cases of atypical laryngeal carcinoid, one occurring in a 67 year old male and the other in a 54 year old female. Indirect laryngoscopy revealed a polypoid supraglottic mass, approximately 3 cm in diameter. Microscopically, each case showed a moderate degree of pleomorphism, tumor necrosis and frequent mitoses. The immunohistochemistry revealed a strong positive reaction for chromogranin, neuron specific enolase and cytokeratin. Each patient had distant metastasis, noted within 4 months after resection (liver and stomach), and died postoperatively at 5 and 20 months, respectively. A brief review of the literature concerning the biological behavior, histogenesis and pathology of atypical laryngeal carcinoid was performed.
Female ; Male ; Humans

Forty cases of infiltrating duct carcinoma of the breast were examined immunohistochemically for expression of TGF-beta and angiogenesis in order to analyze significant correlation with prognostic parameters including tumor size, axillary lymph node metastasis, clinical stage, histologic grade, estrogen receptor and progesterone receptor status. The TGF-beta expression was observed in tumors center and advancing edges of tumors. To determine microvessel density for angiogenesis, we stained endothelial cells for Factor VIII related antigen and counted microvessel within tumor. The results were as follows: 1) The strong immunohistochemical expression of TGF-beta and higher counts of microvessels were observed in advancing edges of tumors (p<0.05). 2) The TGF-beta expression in the advancing edges of tumors was closely related to clinical stage and presence of axillary lymph node metastasis (p<0.05). 3) The mean microvessel counts were significantly higher in tumors from patients with axillary lymph node metastasis and increased with increasing clinical stage (p<0.05). 4) The TGF-beta expression was not related to histologic grade, estrogen receptor and progesterone receptor status(p>0.05). Therefore, the results suggested that the TGF-beta expression and angiogenesis in infiltrating duct carcinoma of the breast may play an important part in prognostic factors, closely related to the lymph node metastasis and clinical stage.
Neoplasm Metastasis

Cerebellar Purkinje cells are selectively vulnerable to ischemia, although the reasons for this are not known. Moreover, an intracellular Ca 2 +/-overload induced by excitotoxicity (toxic glutamate receptor activation) is considered to be a key mediator of central neuronal loss consequent to ischemic damage. Calbindin -D28k is an intracellular calcium binding protein that is expressed in nearly all Purkinje cells of the rat cerebellum. Its major role is presumed to be associated with intracellular Ca 2 +/-buffering. In the present work, In -Situ Hybridization and Western blot methods were used to investigate the changes of calbindin -D28k and its gene expression levels in the rat cerebellum at various times after transient global ischemia. Both level of calbindin -D28k and its mRNA expression level in the cerebellum decreased after ischemic insult, whereas the number of cerebellar Purkinje cells was unaltered after ischemia. In the light of our finding of lower levels of calbindin -D28k and its mRNA in the cerebellum, altered intracellular calcium buffering capacity in the cerebellar Purkinje cell might be presumed. It is believed that this may lead to calcium - mediated cytotoxic events after ischemic insults in cerebellum.
Animals ; Blotting, Western ; Calbindins* ; Calcium ; Carrier Proteins ; Cerebellum ; Gene Expression ; Ischemia ; Neurons ; Purkinje Cells* ; Rats* ; Receptors, Glutamate ; RNA, Messenger

No abstract available.
Budd-Chiari Syndrome ; Humans

No abstract available.
Pancreatic Neoplasms

Many diagnostic tools, which record eye movement, are available for diagnosis and treatment of the patients with impaired eye movement. Most of these tools cannot record directly the eye movement but record electrical analog signal developed when eyeball moves through electrode attached on skin or sclera. Because they need a fixation device, they may bring a patient discomfort. It is well known that digital recording device is not interfered by external noise signal and that its reproducibility is acceptable. We have developed a noninvasive, direct, and precise technique for recording eye movement and verified its reproducibility. We video-taped the horizontal and vertical eye movement and processed the captured images digitally using a image analysis program. the result showed the frequency energy of eye movement in the range within 6Hz and at 10 or 11Hz. The eye movement was observed more clearly after filtering the low frequency energy by inverse Fourier transformation. The reproducibility for measurements of total variability were as follows; vertical displacement measurements, 1.21%; horizontal displacement measurements, 0.68%. In conclusion, this new technique is easy and comfortable to examiner and patient. Its reproducibility was acceptable. Thus it may served as a substitute of conventional tools for recording eye movement.
Diagnosis ; Electrodes ; Eye Movements* ; Fourier Analysis ; Humans ; Noise ; Sclera ; Skin

Apoptosis is a genetically programmed cell death that is required for morphogenesis during embryogenic development and for tissue homeostasis in adult organisms. Although apoptosis is important in the development, expression of apoptosis-related genes has been studied mostly in the cancers and neurodegenerative diseases. We intended to obtain the basic data in order to understand the role of the apoptosis-related genes including bcl-2 in the apoptosis in the human development. Immunohiostochemistry for Bcl-2 was performed using Korean fetal lung, kidney, thymus, placenta, testis, small intestine, pancrease, skin, urinary bladder tissues in the 14~30 weeks of the human development. Our results showed that Bcl-2 appeared in early stages of human development in the lung, kidney, thymus, placenta, small intestine, pancreas. As differentiation grew, expression of Bcl-2 decreased and had the tendency of localizing in the bronchial epitheliums, tubular epitheliums, Bowman's epithelium, lymphocytes, synchytial trophoblasts, intestinal epitheliums, ganglionic cells, ductal epitheliums of pancreas. We suggested that in the early stages when differentiation didn't occur cell death was suppressed, in the late stages when differentiation was achieving cell death increased to remove the innecessary portions of the organs to protect the specific cells of the organs having functions. For the efficiency of the experiment, a high-throughput technique, a tissue-array method was applied which contributed to save time, money and labor without performance errors. Tissue-array technique will be useful to fasten the developmental studies.
Adult ; Male ; Female ; Humans

Fifty patients with mild essential hypertension were studied to evaluate the efficacy of once-daily regimen of nitrendipine, 10~20mg daily for 12 weeks. 1) Thirty-Seven patients completed the study and showed -9% change in mean arterial headache etc. 2) Eight patients were dropped out because of side reaction, namely flushing, palpitation, headache etc. 3) Ambulatory blood pressure monitoring before and after treatment in 3 patients confirmed the drug efficacy revealing 9% decrement in mean blood pressure and 46% decrease in % elevated BP. 4) Twenty patients who were controlled with other hypotensive drugs were well controlled & maintained the blood pressure in normal range after switching to nitrendpine 10~20mg daily. In conclusion, citrendipine is a safe and good antihypertensive calcium antagonist in the treatment of mild hypertensives with 10~20mg of once-daily dosage.
Blood Pressure Monitoring, Ambulatory ; Blood Pressure* ; Calcium ; Flushing ; Headache ; Humans ; Hypertension ; Nitrendipine* ; Reference Values

OBJECTIVE: To determine the changes of nitric oxide production in preeclampsia, the concentration of nitric oxide metabolite, nitrite, was measured in umbilical vein after perfusing plasma from normal pregnant women and preeclamptic pregnant women. MATERIAL AND METHOD: 15 normal and 15 preeclamptic umbilical cords were obtained at the time of cesarean section. Two pieces of umbilical cord in equal length(20 cm in length) were prepared from each umbilical cord. Two pieces of umbilical cord were connected in parallel in a perfusion chamber. One piece of umbilical cord was perfused sequentially for 20-minutes' interval with the perfusates in the order of cord buffer, cord buffer including 15% normal pregnant serum, 15% normal pregnant serum with histamine(10-5mol/L), 15% normal pregnant serum with calcium ionophore A23187(5 mol/L) and the other one was perfused exactly same way using 15% preeclamptic serum instead of 15% normal pregnant serum. All the perfusates used were gassed with 95% O2 and 5% CO2 and warmed to 37degree C. Perfusates were collected in eppendorf tube and freezed at -70degree C until assayed. NO was measured by means of Greiss reaction. one way ANOVA and paired t-test were used where appropriate and p-value < 0.05 was considered significant. RESULTS: NO production in normal umbilical cords was not different regardless of perfusate. Although adding histamine and calcium ionophore, the NO production was slightly increased but statistically not significant in both groups. NO production in preeclamtic umbilical cords was significantly increased with 15% preclamptic serum(15% normal serum vs. 15% preeclamptic serum; 0.060+/-0.016microgram/ml/min vs 0.075+/-0.014microgram/ml/min, p<0.05). CONCLUSION: The preeclamptic sera may not affect the production of NO in the human umbilical vein endothelial cells. The biologic significance of increased NO production in preeclamptic umbilical cord with perfusing preeclamptic serum is unknown, but it might be compensation for the vasoconstriction of preeclampsia.
Calcium ; Cesarean Section ; Compensation and Redress ; Female ; Histamine ; Human Umbilical Vein Endothelial Cells ; Humans ; Nitric Oxide* ; Perfusion ; Plasma ; Pre-Eclampsia* ; Pregnancy ; Pregnant Women ; Umbilical Cord ; Umbilical Veins ; Vasoconstriction

Clinical trials were done to obtain ifnormation on the clinical efficacy, tolerance and side effects of a new antihistarnine, Mecloprodine(Tavegyl), in various skin disordetrs. A total of 48 patients suffered from various skin disorders as urticaria, eczema etc. v ere treated with 2mg. daily for 3 days to 15 days according to state of disorders. The results are as follows. 1. Improvement was noticed in 79.2% of total patients(38/48). 2. Tavegyl was efiective in all 8 cases of acute urticaria and most cases(7/8) of urticaria factitia. 3. Among 19 cases of chronic urticaria, improvement was noticed in 13 cases(68. 49). Improvement was alsa noticed in all 6 cases of eczema. 5. Drowsiness and weakness cccurred in 6.2% of cases(3/48).
Clemastine* ; Eczema ; Humans ; Skin ; Sleep Stages ; Urticaria