Acta bio-medica de L'Ateneo parmense : organo della Societa di medicina e scienze naturali di Parma最新文献

We describe an ectopic inferior third molar which is positioned in the condylar process and associated with an odontogenic cyst. The ectopic third molar is a quite frequent condition but it become unusual when the tooth is placed in the condylar region. In the reported case the removal of both the tooth and the cyst was recommended to solve the infective and articular symptoms and to prevent worse complications like pathologic fractures due to bone's absorption.

We report data from 11 patients < or = 28 weeks' gestation with severe bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) prophylactically treated with palivizumab for prevention of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infection. All babies were receiving pharmacologic respiratory therapy at the moment of discharge from neonatal intensive care unit. Babies received 15 mg/kg i.m. palivizumab every 4 weeks to a max of 5 doses during the period November-March. We compared them with 8 similar infants that did not require therapy at discharge, nor were given any placebo. The treated infants did not present significant side effects. No baby in both groups was infected with RSV during the period of observation. We conclude from these preliminary data that palivizumab did not present contraindications in infants < or = 28 weeks' gestation with severe BPD requiring pharmacologic therapy at discharge. More data are required to evaluate efficacy to prevent RSV infection in these infants.

Spread and modulation of electrical activity in cardiac tissue requires intercellular transfer of current via gap junctions, specialised regions of densely packed ionic channels. Electrotonic interaction is determined not merely by intercellular electrical resistance (Rj) but rather by the interplay of Rj and sarcolemmal passive and active electrical properties (Zaniboni et al., Spitzer et al.). In this work we combined a well established protocol to measure Rj in cell pairs (Weingart e Maurer) with a stimulation protocol which allowed to simultaneously study parameters relative to action potential transfer during sequential stimulation. Current clamp experiments, performed on cardiomyocyte pairs held in double-patch configuration, allowed to simultaneously monitor, at a relatively high frequency (1 Hz), membrane resistance (Rm), resting potential (Vm), maximum depolarization rate (dv/dtmax) and time to peak of dv/dtmax in both cells as well as Rj. Spontaneous electrical uncoupling was observed in guinea pig cell pairs with little or no effect on action potential transfer. Pharmacological uncoupling with 40 microM beta-glycyrrhetinic acid reached, in one case, a much higher level of Rj and dramatically increased time delay for action potential appearance. When only Rj was measured over a short time interval after approximately two minutes from cell-attachments, values of Rj approximately 40 M omega in rat cell pairs (n = 20) and Rj approximately 15 M omega in guinea pig cell pairs (n = 24) were obtained. The possibility of monitoring simultaneously active and intercellular/cellular passive electrical properties makes this protocol particularly suitable to study dynamic changes in Rj during action potential transfer.

The gastric polyps are lesions found in 2-3% of endoscopic procedures. We point out the hystologic nature of these lesions to a correct therapeutic evaluation. The endoscopic polypectomy is today safe; we report our experience in an endoscopic polypectomy with use of endoloop for a giant gastric polyp.

From 1999, at the Orthopaedic Clinic of the University of Siena, 56 patients were treated with the compression hip nail-plate system, a new synthesis device for the treatment of peritrochanteric fractures. The system consists in a new dynamic cephalic screw that could be combined with a plate or a femoral nail. The dynamic cephalic screw of the BCM system has a limited sliding method, impeding excursion greater than 10 mm and preventing excessive collapse of the fracture fragments that can evolve into a shortening of the limb. The canulated nail has a diameter of only 9 mm, which permits insertion into the shaft canal without reaming. The possibility of the double combination of the screw with a plate or with an intramedullary nail permits the surgeon to have a double solution with a single instrument at hand, and offers the opportunity of changing the choice of synthesis method to implant even during surgery.

Osteochondroma, the most common benign bone tumor, represents 10-15% of all bone tumors. It can occur frequently as solitary osteocartilagineous exostosis or rarely as hereditary multiple lesions. The most common sites of occurrence are long bones of the lower arm (50%), usually the lower end of the femur and upper end of the tibia. However, involvement of the small hand and foot bones occurs in 10% of cases, pelvis in 5%, scapulae in 4%, and spine in 2%. Symptoms are not very specific. The authors present an atypical case of osteochondroma.

Secretory otitis media (SOM) is a frequent complication in infants with cleft palate. In cleft palate the muscles that open the Eustachian tube (tensor palatini and levator palatini) have abnormal connections thereby making the tube opening either difficult or impossible. This will lead to secretory otitis media in 95% of cases, since the middle ear will not be aerated. In this paper, 14 patients operated on for cleft palate during the first year of life were examined. SOM was treated only by medical therapy without the insertion of tympanostomy tubes. Post-operative follow-up ranged from 2 months to 5 years. In all patient SOM was still present at last follow-up with poor efficacy of medical therapy. Therefore, our therapeutic protocol includes myringotomy and insertion of tympanostomy tubes during the first general anesthesia for cleft palate treatment.

In this paper the presence of a correlation between plasma Lp(a) levels and peripheral vascular disease (PVD) and/or coronary heart disease (CHD) was investigated in 20 dyslipidaemic patients (10 males and 10 females, well matched for age, type of hyperlydaemia and other CVD risk factors). Lp(a) plasma levels, ECG and carotid and femoral arteries duplex ultrasonography were performed in all the patients. No difference in plasma Lp(a) levels between patients without and with carotid and femoral arteries stenotic lesions was observed. On the contrary Lp(a) was significantly higher in patients with ECG signs of coronary ischaemic heart diseases than in patients with normal ECG. These observations confirm the importance of Lp(a) as a risk factor for coronary heart disease in dyslipidaemic patients.

In the last 100 year, many progresses have been done in the ileal urinary diversion after cystectomy. Although the interest for the continent urinary diversion has increased enormously in the last ten years, the ileal conduit still represents the golden standard. We report our experience.