BACKGROUNDAnomalous origin of the left coronary artery from the pulmonary artery (ALCAPA) is a rare but potentially life-threatening congenital heart defect. A retrospective analysis was carried out to elucidate the surgical outcomes of ALCAPA in infants and children using follow-up echocardiography.

METHODSFrom September 2008 to March 2017, 26 children diagnosed with ALCAPA underwent left coronary re-implantation. All surviving patients received echocardiography during follow-up.

RESULTSThe mortality rate after the operation was 11.5%. Before repair, twenty patients (76.9%) presented with left ventricular (LV) dysfunction. The mean Z-score of the preoperative LV end-diastolic diameter was 4.42 ± 2.09. Mitral regurgitation (MR) was present in all patients. Two patients (7.7%), both with mitral valve prolapse, underwent mitral valve repair at the time of ALCAPA repair. Two children required postoperative extracorporeal membrane oxygenation. LV function normalized at a median time of 5.3 months (range: 0.5-36.0 months). The Z-score of the LV end-diastolic diameter decreased simultaneously. The degree of MR gradually decreased in all surviving patients. All patients had patency of the proximal left coronary artery confirmed by echocardiography at the most recent follow-up. Six patients (26.1%) showed supravalvar pulmonary stenosis and seven patients (30.4%) showed right pulmonary stenosis during follow-up.

CONCLUSIONSCoronary re-implantation was effective for rebuilding a dual coronary system in patients with ALCAPA and resulted in progressive improved LV function and reduced functional MR. Echocardiography was valuable for evaluating the outcomes. LV function, the degree of MR, and possible complications could be detected with follow-up echocardiography.

This study was designed to detect the impact of Valerian Ligusticum Pill (VLP) on cerebral ischemia reperfusion injury in rats, and explore the mechanism of angiogenesis. Sixty SD male rats were randomly divided into five groups, including sham operation group, model group, VLP-low (30mg·kg^-1) group, VLP-high (50mg·kg^-1) group and nimodipine (10mg·kg^-1) group. The ischemia reperfusion injury model was induced by occlusion of middle cerebral artery with suture embolus, reperfusion after 30 minutes' ischemia. When the rats were awake, the first neurological function scores was determined with modified neurological severity score (mNSS). The rats were given VLP (30mg·kg^-1, 50mg·kg^-1) and nimodipine (10mg·kg^-1) through intragastric administration at 2 mL, once a day for a total of 7 days, while an equal amount of distilled water was used in the sham operation group and model control group. After 7 days, the rats were given second neurological function scores, and improvement of neurological function=[the first score]-[the second score]. The rats were sacrificed to investigate the infarction volume percentage with 2,3,5-triphenyl tetrazolium chloride method; do the qualitative and half quantitative analyses for protein vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 2 (VEGFR2) in the tissue of cortex infarction around by Western blot; detect the new blood vessels of cortex infarction around by ki67/lectin immunofluorescence double staining method. Results suggest that VLP could significantly improve the neurological function, reduce the percentage of infarct volume, increase the expression of VEGFR2 and number of new blood vessels in the cortex infarction around compared with model group. In conclusion, VLP may relive the acute cerebral ischemia reperfusion injury in rats by inducing angiogenesis.

OBJECTIVETo evaluate the value of echocardiography in the diagnosis of noncompaction of the ventricular myocardium (NCVM) and to elucidate the echocardiographic characteristics of NCVM.

METHODSThis study included 53 patients (28 boys and 25 girls), with an age for initial diagnosis of 15 days to 18 years, who were diagnosed with NCVM by echocardiography between May 2006 and May 2015. Transthoracic two-dimensional echocardiography and color Doppler were performed for qualitative diagnosis, and the end-diastolic non-compacted layer/compacted layer (N/C) ratio measured in the parasternal ventricular short-axis sectional view was selected as the criterion for quantitative diagnosis.

RESULTSThe excessively prominent ventricular trabeculae and deep inter-trabecular recesses were all seen in 53 cases, and the blood flow in the cardiac chambers was connected to the inter-trabecular recesses. The areas involved in NCVM were mainly the apex (100%) and the middle segment of the left ventricular lateral wall (98%), followed by the middle segment of the left ventricular posterior wall (49%) and the middle segment of the left ventricular inferior wall (42%). In 53 children with NCVM, the N/C ratio was 4.3±1.9 (2.1-10.0). Cardiac insufficiency was found in 83% (44/53) of the children with NCVM, and the left ventricular ejection fraction for these children was (43±9)%.

CONCLUSIONSEchocardiography can be used in the qualitative and quantitative diagnosis of NCVM and in the evaluation of cardiac function. The apex and the middle segment of the left ventricular lateral wall are often involved in NCVM, accompanied by decrease in the left ventricular ejection fraction.

Adolescent ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; Echocardiography ; Female ; Heart Ventricles ; abnormalities ; diagnostic imaging ; Humans ; Infant ; Infant, Newborn ; Male ; Stroke Volume ; Ventricular Function, Left

OBJECTIVETo assess the accuracy of cardiac output (CO) measured by transpulmonary thermodilution technique (TPTD)and explore the validity of intrathoracic blood volume index (ITBVI) for assessment of circulatory volume status.

METHODSTen immature pigs with a mean weight of (20.6±1.9)kg were studied during the conditions including normovolemia, hypervolemia, and hypovolemia. Simultaneous CO was measured in each condition using pulmonary artery thermodilution (PATD) method and TPTD. More specifically, CO (COPA) was determined with PATD, while CO (COTP) and ITBVI were determined with TPTD. All measurements were repeated 3 times. Central venous pressure (CVP) and heart rate were measured at the same time. The potential correlations of CVP and ITBVI with cardiac index (CI) and stroke volume index (SVI) in each blood volume status were analyzed.

RESULTSA total of 90 simultaneous measurements of COPA and COTP in 3 different blood volume conditions were made. The correlation coefficient between the two measurements was 0.977 (P<0.001) and the mean difference was (0.25±0.26)L/min (95%CI:0.20-0.30 L/min, P<0.001). The coefficient of variation of COTP was 3.7%, while COPA was 5.4%. Compared with those in normovolemia, CVP and ITBVI in hypervolemia significantly increased (P=0.002, 0.019), ITBVI in hypovolemia decreased significantly (P<0.001), and CVP in hypovolemia decreased insignificantly (P=0.05). Correlation analysis revealed a significant correlation between ITBVI with CI and SVI in normovolemia (r=0.741, P=0.014; r=0.885, P=0.001). In contrast, correlations between CVP with CI and SVI were poor.

CONCLUSIONSTPTD can accurately and precisely measure CO in different blood volume conditions. ITBVI measured by TPTD has better validity for the assessment of circulatory volume status than CVP.

Animals ; Blood Volume ; Cardiac Output ; Swine ; Thermodilution

Objective Evaluate the effects of venous-arterial modified ultrafiltration on hemodynamics compared to arterial-venous in children undergoing cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) for repair of congenital heart defects. Methods Forty patients underwent MUF randomly divided into two groups,group V-A MUF (n =20) and group A-V MUF (n =20) for 10 min after CPB. They were studied before CPB, after CPB, 10 min after CPB, and 30 min after CPB. Haemodynamic data including heart rate, blood pressure, central venous pressure and hematocrit were recorded. Transoesophaegeal echocardiography determined left ventricular posterior wall thickness in end-systole ( LVPWs) and end-diastole (LVPWd) , end diastolic volume (EDV) , end systolic volume (ESV) and ejection fraction (EF) were measured and compared in two groups. Results Patients in V-A MUF maintained better systolic arterial blood pressure at 10 min and 30 min compared with 0 min values after CPB. A significant decrease in EF were observed in both groups immediately after CPB ( P < 0.05 ). Significant increase in EF was observed at 10 min (60% ) and 30 min (46% ) after CPB compared with 0 min value after bypass in V-A MUF (P <0.001 ). In A-V MUF, no such increase in EF was observed. EF were significantly higher at 10 min and 30 min in V-A MUF as compared with A-V MUF (P < 0. 001). There was also significant improvement in posterior wall thickness in V-A MUF (P <0.05). Haematocrit values were not different in duration of postoperative between two groups. Conclusion Veno-arterial modified ultrafiltration is a safe and effective method of improving hemodynamics in children following cardiac surgery.

The objective of this study was to investigate the effect of human bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) on T lymphocyte killing K562 cells. MSCs were isolated from bone marrow and cultured, T cells were harvested by using nylon column method from peripheral blood. The T cells were co-cultured with MSCs, the phenotype expressions of T cell subsets were detected by flow cytometry. Killing effects of T cells (culture alone and co-culture with MSCs) on K562 cells were detected by LDH, expressions of IFN-gamma and IL-4 were detected by ELISA. The results showed that after T cells were co-cultured with MSCs for three days, the proportion of CD4+ and CD4+CD25+ T cells raised significantly (p<0.05) as compared with group of culture alone, but the proportion of CD8+ T cell were not significantly changed (p>0.05). In group of T cells co-cultured with MSCs, killing effects of T cells on K562 cells weakened, at the same time, expression of IFN-gamma decreased while expression of IL-4 increased. It is concluded that the MSCs weaken killing effects of T cells on K562 cells, which associates with increase of CD4+CD25+ T cell subsets and changes of IFN-gamma and IL-4 levels.
Bone Marrow Cells ; cytology ; CD4 Antigens ; immunology ; Coculture Techniques ; Humans ; Interferon-gamma ; metabolism ; Interleukin-2 Receptor alpha Subunit ; immunology ; Interleukin-4 ; metabolism ; K562 Cells ; Mesenchymal Stromal Cells ; cytology ; immunology ; T-Lymphocyte Subsets ; immunology ; metabolism ; T-Lymphocytes ; cytology ; immunology

BACKGROUNDReal-time three-dimensional echocardiography (RT-3DE) has made revolutionized improvements of cardiac imaging during the past few years. However, there is no standard examination method for RT-3DE so far. This study aimed to establish the diagnostic method of RT-3DE and evaluate its application in the diagnosis of complex congenital heart diseases (CHD).

METHODSFifty patients with complex CHD were examined by RT-3DE with modes of Live 3DE and Full Volume. A series of novel volumetric views combined with Van Praagh sequential segmental approach were introduced to reveal the pathological morphology of the hearts, which were compared with the findings of two-dimensional echocardiography (2DE), angiography and cardiac surgery.

RESULTSIn 50 patients, 190 image acquisitions of Full Volume were performed at several acoustic windows including subcostal, apical and parasternal regions. Among them, 94.2% (179/190) of image acquisitions were successful. Most sectional volumetric views could be clearly displayed in 92.6% of the successful image acquisitions. However, sectional volumetric views could not be clearly displayed in 7.4%, which was mainly due to poor perspective conditions of examination location, improper instrument multi-parameter setting and insufficient information of whole heart captured in Full Volume acquisitions. As compared with surgical findings and angiography, RT-3DE made correction to the diagnoses in 2 cases including 1 with corrected transposition of the great arteries and the other with single atrium and mitral cleft. The diagnoses initially made by 2DE for these 2 patients were double outlet right ventricle with transposition of the great arteries and complete atrio-ventricular septal defect.

CONCLUSIONSRT-3DE can clearly display the pathological morphology of complex CHD by a series of novel volumetric views combined with sequential segmental approach through providing more spatial informative cardiovascular structures, which provides a practical method for RT-3DE diagnosis.

Child ; Child, Preschool ; Echocardiography, Three-Dimensional ; methods ; Female ; Heart Defects, Congenital ; diagnostic imaging ; Humans ; Infant ; Infant, Newborn ; Male

OBJECTIVETo probe into clinical value of comprehensive program of acupuncture, moxibustion and massage as main for treatment of cervical spondylopathy of the nerve root type.

METHODSFive centers, single blind, randomized controlled method were used, 660 cases were divided into a treatment group of 317 cases and a control group of 311 cases. They were treated respectively with comprehensive program of acupuncture, moxibustion and massage as main, and comprehensive program of physical therapy as main. Establish syndrome detection scale and multiply dimensional effect assessment indexes, and evaluate the therapeutic effects and safety.

RESULTSThe cured rate, the cured-markedly effective rate were 42.9%, 64.4% in the treatment group, respectively, better than 16.7%, 36.3% in the control group (P<0.01); after treatment of 2 weeks, clinical symptoms improved in the both groups, but the treatment group was better than the control group in the improvement degrees of neck-shoulder-limb pain, neck rigidity, abnormality of cervical anteflexion, etc. (P<0.01 or P<0.05); the treatment group was shorter than the control group in the time of producing the effect and therapeutic course (P<0.01).

CONCLUSIONComprehensive program of acupuncture, moxibustion and massage as main is safe and effective for treatment of cervical spondylopathy, with a better therapeutic effect compared with the comprehensive program of physical therapy.

Acupuncture Therapy ; Humans ; Massage ; Moxibustion ; Single-Blind Method ; Spinal Diseases

Pulmonary hypertension(PH) is a clinical hemodynamic syndrome characterized by elevation of pulmonary artery pressure and pulmonary vascular resistance,which was presumed mainly due to pulmonary vasoconstriction,remodeling of the pulmonary vessel wall,and thrombosis in situ.Endothelin,nitric oxide,and prostacyclin pathway were three major pathways involved in the pathogenesis.Current therapies interfered with these 3 pathways in combination with conventional measures have prolonged length of life of patients and improved their quality of life significantly.