Surgical treatment of colonic diverticulitis: a report of 205 cases

In a series of 205 patients treated for colonic diverticulitis, 101 presented acute complications, 35 chronic complications and 69 attacks of diverticulitis without complications. The treatment prescribed for the acute septic complications (generalized peritonitis, perisigmoidic abscess) as well as for acute occlusions consists of two-stage surgery: drainage and emergency colostomy, then secondary colectomy in elective conditions. Massive incoercible hemorrhages were treated by emergency hemostatic resection, guided by selective mesenteric arteriography. Chronic complications (inflammatory stenosing tumor, external or internal fistulas) are ideally treated by a one-stage colic resection. As postoperative mortality and morbidity rates are high and caused by acute conditions, it is justifiable to perform a prophylactic colic resection.     

Surgical treatment for duodenal involvement in Crohn''s disease: report of a case

BACKGROUND: Aerobic bacterial pathogens are recovered from 65 to 85% of patients with acute otitis media (AOM). Although Chlamydia pneumoniae is a common pathogen of pediatric pneumonia, it has rarely been cultured from children with chronic otitis media and its role in AOM is unknown. METHODS: We cultured for C. pneumoniae in tympanocentesis aspirates and nasopharyngeal swabs from 101 consecutive, otherwise healthy children with AOM or refractory AOM. A control group of 50 similarly aged, healthy children was evaluated for nasopharyngeal carriage of C. pneumoniae. Specimens were also evaluated by PCR for C. pneumoniae. RESULTS: C. pneumoniae was recovered by tympanocentesis in 8 (8%) of 101 children with AOM. Among the 8 children with C. pneumoniae-positive-AOM, 5 had C. pneumoniae detected by PCR in middle ear fluid, none had C. pneumoniae recovered by nasopharyngeal culture or PCR and 5 were younger than 16 months. C. pneumoniae was the sole pathogen isolated in 2 patients. Copathogens included beta-lactamase-positive positive Haemophilus influenzae (2), beta-lactamase positive Moraxella catarrhalis (1), penicillin-resistant Streptococcus pneumoniae (2) and penicillin-susceptible S. pneumoniae (1). C. pneumoniae was recovered from nasopharyngeal culture in 2 additional patients with C. pneumoniae-negative AOM and in none of 50 healthy control children, although 2 controls were positive by PCR from the nasopharynx. CONCLUSIONS: This is the first study to report the isolation of C. pneumoniae in middle ear fluid of children with AOM.     

Surgical treatment of choledochal cyst in adults: results and long-term follow-up

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Results of the surgical management of 60 adults with choledochal cysts at Chang Gung Memorial Hospital Taipei are presented. PATIENTS AND METHODS: All patients were diagnosed and surgically managed during the period between March 1979 and December 1992. There were 47 females and 13 males, with ages ranging from 16 to 81 years (mean age = 31.9 years). Of the total, there were 41 Type I, one Type II, 14 Type IV, and four Type V choledochal cysts classified according to Todani's classification system. The definite surgical procedures were cyst excision and hepatico-jejunostomy in 43 cases in type I and IV diseases, one cyst excision in type II disease, two hepatectomy for type V disease, cyst enterostomy in seven cases, and T-tube choledochocystostomy in seven cases. RESULTS: The operative mortality rate was 3.3% and the complication rate related to the surgical procedure was 20%. Early postoperative complications include wound infection, leakage of anastomosis, acute pancreatitis, septic shock, left pleural effusion, and intra-abdominal abscessing. Reoperations were needed in the early postoperative days in two cases due to hepatico-jejunostomy leakage and intraabdominal abscess formation. Long-term surgical outcome, concerning recurrence of symptoms, was related to the following factors, excluding the factors of surgery: presence of bile duct lithiasis, common channel less than 22 mm, presence of preoperative pancreatitis and acute angle type pancreaticobiliary unions. Only common channel less than 22 mm is statistically significant. The percentage of recurrence of the symptoms after resectional surgery was 32.5% in the long term follow-up period. Most of the cases responded well to an antibiotics treatment. Three of the cases required a second operation or PTCD as well as dilatation to treat the recurrent cholangitis. CONCLUSION: Although the recurrence of symptoms is not uncommon and satisfactory explanation of the analysed factors is still the treatment of choice for adult patients with choledochal cysts.     

Surgical treatment of Cronkhite-Canada syndrome associated with protein-losing enteropathy: report of a case

PURPOSE: The case of a patient with Cronkhite-Canada syndrome, who developed a protein-losing enteropathy, is reported. METHODS: After localization of the protein-losing region, a right colectomy was performed. RESULTS: Hypoproteinemia and ectodermal changes improved postoperatively. CONCLUSIONS: Surgery is an effective treatment for protein-losing enteropathy in Cronkhite-Canada syndrome. Ectodermal changes improve after correcting malnutrition.     

Surgical treatment of spontaneous rupture of the esophagus: case report

OBJECTIVE: To explore the effect of the Xingbei Granule (XBG) in treating bronchial asthma and its mechanism. METHODS: Systematic clinical observation and animal experimental study on the XBG were carried out. RESULTS: The XBG not only could reduce the symptom of asthma, improve the ventilatory function effectively, but also has the effect of antagonizing the change of asthmatic inflammatory medium, alleviating the air-way's inflammatory reaction and lowering the air-way's hyperreactivity. CONCLUSION: XBG do attain the dual goal of controlling the asthmatic symptoms and reducing the asthmatic attack.     

Prostate cancer: 6. Surgical treatment of localized disease

A 65-year-old man undergoes a routine checkup before retiring. His wife has urged him to have his prostate examined, because she has read about testing for prostate cancer and a friend has just died of this disease. During the rectal examination, the man's physician discovers some firmness in the right lobe of the prostate gland. The patient has had no urinary symptoms and is in excellent general health. Sexual function is normal. There is no history of prostate cancer; his father died of a stroke at age 86 years. Testing shows that the patient's prostate-specific antigen level is 9.3 ng/mL, and he is referred to a urologist. Transrectal ultrasound-guided needle biopsy reveals adenocarcinoma with a Gleason score of 7 (intermediate grade). At a follow-up meeting with his physician, the patient says, "I have been doing some research, and it appears that I should have treatment. However, what is less clear to me is what form of therapy is best--surgery or radiation treatment. Please tell me what you can about the state of the art with respect to surgery."     

Surgical treatment of juxta-renal abdominal aortic occlusion: report of 27 cases

Juxta-renal abdominal aortic occlusion is a relatively rare disease. We have treated 27 patients (25 males and 2 females) since 1984. Operations were performed on 25 patients, of whom 4 died and 84% improved. The main etiology was aorto-iliac stenosis or occlusion due to atherosclerosis and Takayasu's arteritis. Diagnostic basis included ischemia of lower limbs, pulselessness of abdominal aorta and both femoral arteries, sexual dysfunction, and positive result of angiography. Effective control of aorta below the left renal vein, aortotomy and retrograde endarterectomy were the main operative procedures. Axillo-bifemoral arterial bypass is recommended for patients associated with multiple diseases. The operative result is determined by associated diseases and the condition of run-off vessel. Associated diseases directly affect the mortality rate.     

Multicenter study of penile cancer

The objective was to examine the relationships between serum ferritin, alcohol intake, and socioeconomic factors (school education, occupational education, occupation, income, marital status, cohabitation status, housing, social class) in a population survey performed in Copenhagen County during 1982-1984. The participants were selected at random from the census register and comprised 2235 healthy Danish individuals, non-blood donors (1044 men, 1191 women) in cohorts being 30, 40, 50, and 60 years old. The participants gave a detailed social and medical history and had a clinical examination including blood samples. In all age-groups, men had significantly higher serum ferritin and alcohol intake than women. In men, there was no relationship between serum ferritin and social class. Significant relationships were observed between ferritin and occupation (unemployed and self-employed men had higher ferritin than those with other occupations) and ferritin and income (in younger men, ferritin displayed a steady increase with income). None of the social variables were related to the prevalence of iron deficiency or iron overload. Alcohol intake was related to occupation and income, but not to social class. In women, none of the social variables showed any significant relationship to ferritin levels or iron overload. The prevalence of small iron stores (serum ferritin < or = 30 micrograms/l) was lower and the intake of alcohol was higher in women from high social classes. In both men and women, serum ferritin displayed highly significant positive correlations with alcohol intake. Likewise, the prevalence of iron overload (serum ferritin > 90th percentile) was closely correlated to alcohol intake. In conclusion, socioeconomic factors per se had a minor influence on serum ferritin levels and iron status in Danes. The distinct association between alcohol intake and serum ferritin levels should be considered in future iron status surveys.     

Surgical treatment of stomach cancer: analysis of our personal experience

The "curative" treatment of gastric carcinoma includes the complete removal of the tumour and of the nodes involved without any macroscopic residual of disease (RO). Out of 326 patients with gastric cancer observed, a series of 114 consecutive patients underwent surgical resection (total gastrectomy or subtotal distal gastrectomy) with D2 or D3 lymphadenectomy. Overall operative mortality was 5.3%. Since 1988 no postoperative death occurred. Overall morbidity was 15.8%, specific morbidity 10.5%, reduced after 1988 to 6.6%. No significant differences in operative mortality and need of blood transfusions were recorded between D2 and D3 lymphadenectomy. Overall 5-year survival was 32%. Univariate and multivariate analysis showed that only T and N stages are significant prognostic factors, whereas tumour location, total or subtotal gastrectomy in antral cancers, extent of lymphadenectomy (D2 vs D3) and histology were not significantly related to survival. Since most studies have clearly shown that T and N stages are the most important prognostic factors in gastric cancer, the present aim should be to plan the extent of surgical resection according to the T and N stages characteristics of the neoplasm.     

Pyoderma gangrenosum: a report of 44 cases with follow-up

Results of a study of 44 patients with pyoderma gangrenosum (PG) are presented. Each patient was diagnosed using standardized diagnostic criteria and followed up systematically. Thirty patients were women and 14 men. Their mean age was 50 years (range 11-80). Twenty patients had idiopathic and 14 parainflammatory occurrences (e.g. ulcerative colitis, Crohn's disease), whereas in 10 patients an associated haemoproliferative disease or neoplasia was noted. Whereas idiopathic and parainflammatory PG was found predominantly in women, the association with haemoproliferative diseases occurred more often in men. The lower legs and feet represented the typical predilection sites. Fifty-two per cent of patients had one lesion, 37% had up to five, and 11% had more than five lesions. Histologically, lymphocytic and/or leucocytoclastic vasculitis was present in 73% of the biopsy specimens obtained from the borders of the lesions. Long-term follow-up (n = 42, median follow-up 26.5 months) revealed that eight patients had died, in six cases due to the PG and/or the underlying diseases. Of the remaining 34 patients, 44% are in complete remission without further treatment, whereas continuing therapy is needed in 56%. No difference between idiopathic and parainflammatory PG was demonstrable in the follow-up and in no patient with idiopathic PG was a possibly related disease diagnosed in the follow-up. These data suggest that PG should be considered to be an independent disease and not a purely cutaneous complication in most patients.     

Surgical treatment of impotence in the male. An 18-year experience with 250 penile implants

Differences in radiosensitivity, expressed by the death rate up to the 30th day after irradiation by single whole-body exposures in the region of LD50, were followed in mice caged in groups by five, 15 and 25 individuals. No marked differences in the whole=group mortality of differently sized collectives were detected. Preirradiation as well as postirradiation leucocyte counts (after a sublethal irradiation) exhibit, however, differences, which correspond to an assumed different degree of the adrenocortical activity in differently sized collectives. Also the follow-up of the stress reactivity of the animals by measuring the Na/K ratio in 24-hour-samples of urine prior to irradiation demonstrated marked differences between the groups with low number and high number of animals in a cage. By correlating values of this indirect indicator of the adrenocortical activity with manifestations of the individual radiosensitivity it was found that the extremely hyporeactive animals (belonging to groups with five animals per cage) and the extremely hyperreactive ones (belonging to groups with 25 animals per cage) exhibit a markedly higher mortality. The absence of differences in the whole-group mortality of differently sized collectives can be explained by the existence of nonlinear "U"-shaped relations between the adrenocortical activity and the individuals' radiosensitivity. The results support the conception on the unfavorable prognostic significance of unbalanced reactions of homeostatic functions of system regulation under conditions of radiation syndrome.     

Surgical treatment of primary lung cancer in women

Among 1906 lung carcinoma cases treated in the clinic up to 1975 inclusive, there were 182 women (9.5%). The comparative study of 84 women and 927 men operated upon, proved the operability and resectability in women (46.1% +/- 3.7 and 34.1 +/- 3.5) to be lower than in men (53.8% +/- 1.2 and 46.3% +/- 1.2). Peripheral cancer was found in 28.6% +/- 3.3 of women and in 23.6% +/- 1.0 of men. The main histological form of the tumor in women was glandular carcinoma (45.2% +/- 6.3) and in men squamous cell carcinoma (62.2% +/- 1.7). The lobectomy was the most common of radical operations performed in women (58.1% +/- 6.2); in men it was the pneumectomy (65.1% +/- 1.7). In 6 of 26 women suffering from neoplasm of stage III the vast pneumectomy was carried out; in men this operation constituted 46.1% of all cases of total lung removal. The immediate results in women (complications--14.3% +/- 8.8 and mortality--2.4% +/- 1.7) are better than in men (24.1% +/- 1.4 and 9.3% +/- 1.0). The five-year follow-up showed the survival in women to be 39.1% +/- 10.6 and in men 28.3% +/- 3.0.     

Surgical treatment for the recurrence of colorectal cancer

Analysis by two-dimensional gel electrophoresis of the N-laurylsarkosinate(Sarkosyl)-insoluble envelope complexes of L-[35]S-cysteine-labeled elementary bodies of Chlamydia pneumoniae strain IOL-207, Chlamydia trachomatis serovar LGV2, D, and F, and Chlamydia psittaci strain 6BC showed differences in the molecular charges of chlamydial outer membrane proteins. The apparent isoelectric point (pI) of the major outer membrane protein of C. pneumoniae strain IOL-207 was 6.4, whereas the pI of the major outer membrane protein of the C. trachomatis and C. psittaci strains differed little from one another, ranging from 5.3 to 5.5. The 60-kDa cysteine-rich protein of C. pneumoniae was the only 60-kDa chlamydial protein with a pI value (5.9) more acidic than that of the corresponding major outer membrane protein. As a general rule, the charges of both the 60-kDa and the low-molecular-mass (12-15 kDa) cysteine-rich proteins were widely variable, depending on the strain. However, in each individual strain, the variation of the charge of the 60-kDa protein had a compensatory change in the low-molecular-mass cysteine-rich protein.     

Surgical experience with intracardiac myxomas: long-term follow-up

BACKGROUND: Myxomas are the most common benign intracardiac tumors. This report summarizes our 20-year experience with these tumors. METHODS: Sixty-six patients (25 male) with a median age of 39 years (range, 6 to 70 years) underwent surgical excision of primary or recurrent intracardiac myxomas during the years 1976 to 1996. Symptom duration ranged from 2 to 8 months. There were 55 left atrial myxomas, 10 right atrial myxomas, and 1 biatrial myxoma. Three of the patients were in one family. The surgical approach comprised complete wide excision. RESULTS: There were two early deaths. Late follow-up is 89% (57/64) complete. There was one late death, which was not due to a cardiac cause. Echocardiography at a mean follow-up of 66.9 months (range, 7 to 241 months) showed no recurrence of sporadic myxomas. However, 2 of the 3 patients with familial myxomas had recurrence. CONCLUSIONS: Surgical excision of atrial myxoma gives excellent short-term and long-term results leading to eventual cure of nonfamilial myxomas. However, familial myxomas retain a strong tendency to recur even 20 years after excision.     

Basaloid squamous cell carcinoma: a distinctive human papilloma virus-related penile neoplasm: a report of 20 cases

OBJECTIVE: To estimate the costs and benefits to community pharmacies of converting a traditional practice into one based on pharmaceutical care. SETTING: Community-based ambulatory care pharmacies. PRACTICE DESCRIPTION: Community pharmacy. PRACTICE INNOVATION: Pharmaceutical care. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Costs incurred and revenues received. DESIGN: Twenty-five community pharmacies that had made the transition from traditional practice to one based on pharmaceutical care returned a survey providing data on the costs and revenues associated with the transition. RESULTS: Mean total cost of making the conversion for the 25 pharmacies was $36,207. The largest cost component associated with the transition was personnel, which had a mean cost of $16,512 per pharmacy. Mean revenues received for pharmaceutical care by these 25 pharmacies was $3,687, mainly for disease management services. Pharmacies that spent more on the conversions, and used brochures and physician detailing as well as consultants and franschises, tended to be more successful in generating revenues from pharmaceutical care. CONCLUSION: Most pharmacies that have made the conversion to pharmaceutical care have not experienced an increase in profits as a result of that conversion. More effort needs to be directed toward improving the flow of revenues obtained from providing pharmaceutical care.