Weimann et al investigated whether genetic factors contribute to the ability of inhaled nitric oxide to increase oxygenation in patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome. Results suggest a ...relation between the oxygenation response to inhaled nitric oxide and the ABO blood-group system.
The hypothesis of a seasonal pattern in the onset of symptoms for some vasculitides has been raised in previous small studies.
Using the data collected by the American College of Rheumatology (ACR) ...Subcommittee on Classification of Vasculitis, we specifically tested for a higher proportion of onset of symptoms in winter, lower in summer, and intermediate for the other seasons for polyarteritis nodosa (PAN) and Wegener's granulomatosis. We also tested for a higher proportion of onset of symptoms in the spring-summer months for giant cell arteritis (GCA).
The results of our study support the hypothesis of a seasonal trend for the onset of symptoms of Wegener's granulomatosis (p = 0.04) as described previously. No seasonal pattern was found for the other vasculitides studied (PAN and GCA).
OBJECTIVE: The Challenger spacecraft explosion in 1986 offered an
opportunity to study the thinking of normal children after a sudden and
distant disaster, differences in thinking among children of ...different
levels of emotional concern and different ages, and changes in their
thinking over time. METHOD: The authors studied six thinking patterns known
to characterize childhood posttraumatic stress disorder and four additional
hypothesized patterns in 153 randomly selected children of Concord, N.H.
(who watched the explosion on television) and Porterville, Calif. (who
heard about it later). They compared the structured-interview responses of
the more involved (East Coast) and less involved (West Coast) children, of
the latency-age children and the adolescents, and of the children initially
(5-7 weeks after the explosion) and 14 months later. RESULTS: The children
exhibited the 10 predictable thinking patterns. They initially defended
themselves, denying the reality of the explosion. They later fantasized
about it. They tried to cope by seeking additional information on their
own, at home, and at school. Most children talked about Challenger, but a
minority of the latency-age youngsters avoided related talk and thoughts.
The adolescents experienced more paranormal thinking, philosophical
changes, and negative attitudes. Over the year, omens, paranormal
experiences, and Challenger-based fantasies tended to disappear, but
negative views about institutions and the world's future held steady or
increased. CONCLUSIONS: The children's thinking followed predictable
patterns. A higher degree of emotional involvement (East Coast children)
was strongly linked to these thinking patterns, as was being an adolescent.
Distant disasters appear to set up commonalities of thought that might come
to characterize certain generations of children.
To evaluate the prevalence of intermittent opacification, a finding previously described as diagnostic of active bleeding that allows identification of an injured vessel at initial aortography or ...first-order selective angiography.
Retrospective review was performed of 35 consecutive cases that were positive for true or false aneurysm, arteriovenous fistula or malformation, or hemorrhage when a lesion was located beyond a first-order branch of the aorta. An artery that potentially supplied the lesion was considered positive if it filled with contrast material, emptied, and filled again while adjacent vessels demonstrated progressive opacification.
Nine (26%) of the 35 cases demonstrated intermittent opacification of an injured artery. All were confirmed as true-positive with superselective catheterization or additional projections, and seven were successfully treated with transcatheter embolization. Intermittent opacification was associated only with false aneurysm and hemorrhage. No congenital arteriovenous malformations or congenital aneurysms demonstrated intermittent opacification.
If present, the intermittent opacification of an artery is a valuable finding that assists in superselective transcatheter embolization of the arterial branch that supplies a false aneurysm or hemorrhage.
To determine the influence of osteoarthritis (OA) on bone density measurements and whether OA at one site is associated with OA at other sites.
Nonrandomized, cross sectional observational study; ...secondary analysis of a general population database. Sixty-four subjects derived from a longitudinal study of long distance runners and community controls had a complete peripheral radiographic evaluation for osteoarthritic changes in hands, knees, and lumbar spine. Forty-four of these were studied in 1984 with quantitative computed tomography (QCT) of L1, and 54 were studied in 1988 with 153-Gd dual photon absorptiometry (DPA) in the spine and total body. Thirty-four subjects had all measurements done.
Total body and lumbar spine DPA were positively correlated with radiological scores of OA in the spine and knees, with coefficients ranging between 0.467 to 0.530 (p < 0.001 in all cases). This correlation was principally associated with spinal spurs and knee sclerosis. Results of stepwise multiple linear regression modeling for QCT included age, spine sclerosis, knee sclerosis and knee spurs as the main predictors of bone mineral density (BMD). For DPA measurements, spine spur score was a useful regressor for all the models. Altogether, the percentage of variance accounted for by individual radiological OA variables was 27.4% for lumbar QCT, 27.3% for lumbar BMD, 7.3% for total spine BMD, and 45.2% for total body BMD. OA scores at different sites were not correlated, although repeated assessment at the same site showed very close correlation.
All methods used to determine BMD showed a highly significant positive correlation between lumbar and knee radiological OA and bone mineral content both in the spine and the total body. Thus, our results support the hypothesis that OA is negatively correlated with osteopenia. OA, as seen in this population, was not a generalized condition, but rather, was site specific.
Prior studies have demonstrated inefficacy among dopamine receptor antagonists for treating cocaine dependence. An alternative approach would be to investigate the ability of indirect inhibitors of ...cortico-mesolimbic dopamine release, such as the 5-HT
3 receptor antagonist ondansetron, to reduce cocaine's reinforcing effects. We hypothesized that ondansetron might be more efficacious than placebo at reducing cocaine intake and promoting abstinence in cocaine-dependent individuals. In a pilot randomized, double-blind, 10-week controlled trial, 63 treatment-seeking, cocaine-dependent men and women received ondansetron (0.25
mg, 1.0
mg, or 4.0
mg twice daily) or placebo. Up to three times per week, participants were assessed on several measures of cocaine use, including urine benzoylecgonine. Cognitive behavioral therapy was administered weekly. Ondansetron was well tolerated, causing no serious adverse events. The ondansetron 4.0
mg group had the lowest dropout rate among all treatment groups and a greater rate of improvement in percentage of participants with a cocaine-free week compared with the placebo group (
p
=
0.02), whereas the ondansetron 1.0
mg group had a lower rate of improvement in percentage of weekly mean non-use days than did placebo recipients (
p
=
0.04). These results suggest the possibility of a non-linear dose–response function, with evidence supporting efficacy for the 4.0
mg group.
The medial preoptic area (MPOA) is an important region for masculine sexual behavior. Because galanin (GAL) immunoreactive cells within the MPOA are affected by the gonadal steroid environment and ...GAL binding is apparent, GAL was microinjected site specifically in 0, 10, 50, 100, and 500 ng doses in order to determine effects on copulatory behavior. Unilateral microinjection of GAL within the medial preoptic nucleus facilitated copulatory behavior in a dose-responsive fashion, evidenced by an increase in the percentage of males that displayed sexual behaviors and a decrease in mount and intromission latencies. These effects required the presence of gonadal steroids, and were not due to general arousal as measured in open field testing. The techniques of survival analysis were used to display data and for statistical analysis of intromission and mount latencies; these approaches revealed significant effects that were not evident with more commonly used procedures. The results support the suggestion that sexually dimorphic galaninergic cell groups within the MPOA are involved in gonadal steroid-induced masculine sexual behavior.
We present the first model-independent measurement of the helicity of W bosons produced in top quark decays, based on a 1 fb(-1) sample of candidate tt events in the dilepton and lepton plus jets ...channels collected by the D0 detector at the Fermilab Tevatron pp Collider. We reconstruct the angle theta(*) between the momenta of the down-type fermion and the top quark in the W boson rest frame for each top quark decay. A fit of the resulting costheta(*) distribution finds that the fraction of longitudinal W bosons f(0)=0.425+/-0.166(stat)+/-0.102(syst) and the fraction of right-handed W bosons f(+)=0.119+/-0.090(stat)+/-0.053(syst), which is consistent at the 30% C.L. with the standard model.
Previous studies showed that a combination of posttransplant total lymphoid irradiation (TLI), rabbit antithymocyte globulin (ATG), and a single donor blood transfusion induced tolerance to ACI heart ...allografts in Lewis rats. All three modalities were required to achieve tolerance. The objective of the current study was to determine the subset(s) of cells in the donor blood that facilitated long-term allograft survival.
Lewis hosts received TLI, ATG, and donor cell infusion after heart transplantation. Graft survival, mixed leukocyte reaction (MLR), and intragraft cytokine mRNA were studied.
The intravenous injection of 25 x 10(6) ACI peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) significantly prolonged graft survival as compared with that of Lewis hosts given TLI and ATG alone. Injection of highly enriched blood T cells or splenic B cells adjusted for the number contained in 25 x 10(6) PBMC failed to induce significant graft prolongation. Unexpectedly, depletion of monocytes (CD11b+ cells) from PBMC resulted in the loss of graft prolongation activity. Enriched populations of monocytes obtained by plastic adherence were more efficient in prolonging graft survival than PBMC on a per cell basis. Hosts with long-term grafts (>100-day survival) showed evidence of immune deviation, because the MLR to ACI stimulator cells was vigorous, but secretion of interferon-gamma in the MLR was markedly reduced. In situ hybridization studies of long-term grafts showed markedly reduced levels of interferon-gamma mRNA as compared with rejecting grafts.
Infusion of donor monocytes facilitated graft prolongation via immune deviation.
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