OBJECTIVES:To describe the characteristics of childhood poisoning leading to consultation to 17 pediatric emergency departments in Spain.
METHODS:During a 2-year period (January 2001 to December ...2002), accompanying people of 2157 children with acute intoxication who visited consecutively at the emergency room were prospectively surveyed.
RESULTS:Childhood poisoning accounted for 0.28% of all emergency visits during the study period. The median (interquartile range, 25th-75th percentile) age was 24 months (22-60 months); 67% of children were younger than 4 years. Drug ingestion was involved in 54.7% of cases (paracetamol was the most frequent drug), domestic products in 28.9%, alcohol in 5.9%, carbon monoxide in 4.5%, and illicit drugs in 1.5%. A total of 61.3% of patients were admitted within 1 hour after exposure to the toxic substance, and 10.3% had been already treated before arrival; 29.1% of patients were referred for clinical manifestations which were mostly neurological symptoms. Laboratory tests and other investigations were performed in 40.7% of cases. Gastrointestinal decontamination was used in 51.7% of patients, with activated charcoal in 32.3%. Treatment varied significantly according to the individual hospitals. A total of 83.3% of patients were treated as outpatients, 15.2% were hospitalized, and 1.5% were admitted to the intensive care unit. One 11-month-old boy with carbon monoxide intoxication died. Six patients had permanent sequelae (esophageal stenosis in 5 and partial blindness in 1).
CONCLUSIONS:Young children who accidentally ingested drugs and, less frequently, domestic products accounted for most cases of intoxication who presented at the pediatric emergency department.
OBJECTIVETo determine the clinical evolution of children with skull fractures as a result of a minor head trauma from a witnessed accidental fall that have been studied by transfontanellar ultrasound ...(TFUS).
METHODSObservational study for 2 years (2004–2006) of children up to 1 year of age who suffered a skull fracture after minor head trauma and for whom a TFUS was carried out as the first neuroimaging test to rule out intracranial injuries.
RESULTSOne hundred and twenty-three children were evaluated. The mean age was 5.7 months (SD 2.9) and the most common mechanism of injury was rolling off the bed. In seven (5.7%) patients, a computed tomography (CT) was eventually performed after TFUS; in two of these patients, this was because of the detection of possible intracranial alterations and in the others, it was because of a small fontanelle. Both patients with abnormal TFUS had a small epidural haematoma on the CT scan that did not need surgery. The clinical course for all patients was uneventful.
CONCLUSIONTFUS is a valid and reliable alternative to CT for minor head trauma in infants with skull fractures. Its innocuousness and cost-effectiveness in comparison with CT makes it a good choice in this situation.
We studied the effects of 5
μM atorvastatin, 2
μM rosiglitazone and their combination on intracellular cholesterol levels and on the expression of genes controlling cholesterol trafficking in human ...monocytes during their differentiation into macrophages. Our results show that treatment with rosiglitazone caused an increase in CD36 mRNA and protein levels (2.7- and 2.9-fold,
P
<
0.001), but significantly induced the expression of most genes related to cholesterol efflux: ABCA1 mRNA (23%,
P
<
0.05) and protein (2.4-fold,
P
<
0.05), apo E protein (2.4-fold,
P
<
0.05), caveolin-1 mRNA (2.6-fold,
P
<
0.001) and SR-BI mRNA (1.9-fold,
P
<
0.001) and protein (3-fold,
P
<
0.01). As a consequence, rosiglitazone treatment reduced intracellular free cholesterol levels by 22% (
P
<
0.01). Treatment with 5
μM atorvastatin caused the opposite effect on the expression of cholesterol efflux-related genes, which was generally reduced: ABCA1 mRNA (71%,
P
<
0.05), apo E mRNA (46%,
P
<
0.001) and protein (5.6-fold,
P
<
0.001), and CYP27 mRNA (15%,
P
<
0.05). Despite these reductions, intracellular total and free cholesterol levels were also reduced by 30% (
P
<
0.01), an effect that can be attributed to the inhibition of de novo cholesterol synthesis by the statins. The combination of rosiglitazone with atorvastatin attenuated CD36 induction, and caused reductions similar to those caused by the statin alone on the expression of genes involved in cholesterol efflux and on intracellular cholesterol levels.
Distributed southwell Wolfson-Pou, Jordi; Chow, Edmond
Proceedings of the International Conference for High Performance Computing, Networking, Storage and Analysis,
11/2017
Conference Proceeding
We present a new algorithm, the Distributed Southwell method, as a competitor to Block Jacobi for preconditioning and multigrid smoothing. It is based on the Southwell iterative method, which is ...sequential, where only the equation with the largest residual is relaxed per iteration. The Parallel Southwell method extends this idea by relaxing equation i if it has the largest residual among all the equations coupled to variable i. Since communication is required for processes to exchange residuals, this method in distributed memory can be expensive. Distributed Southwell uses a novel scheme to reduce this communication of residuals while avoiding deadlock. Using test problems from the SuiteSparse Matrix Collection, we show that Distributed Southwell requires less communication to reach the same accuracy when compared to Parallel Southwell. Additionally, we show that the convergence of Distributed Southwell does not degrade like that of Block Jacobi when the number of processes is increased.
Ritonavir, a protease inhibitor used in combination antiretroviral therapy for HIV-1 infection, is associated with an increased risk of premature atherosclerosis. The aim of the present study was to ...assess the effects of ritonavir, in the absence of added lipoproteins, on the expression of genes that control cholesterol trafficking in human monocytes/macrophages.
THP-1 cells were used to study the effects of ritonavir on the expression of CD36, ATP binding cassette transporters A1 (ABCA1) and G1 (ABCG1), scavenger receptor B class I (SR-BI), caveolin-1 and sterol 27-hydroxylase (CYP27). Exposure to ritonavir (2.5 mug/ml) increased CD36 protein (28%, P < 0.05) and mRNA (38%, P < 0.05) in differentiated THP-1 macrophages, but not in undifferentiated monocytes. This effect was not related to the increase in PPARgamma expression (51%, P < 0.05) caused by ritonavir. Ritonavir also reduced SR-BI protein levels (46%, P < 0.05) and increased CYP27 (43%, P < 0.05) and ABCA1 (49%, P < 0.05) mRNA expression. Liver X receptor alpha (LXRalpha) mRNA, protein and binding activity were also increased by ritonavir treatment.
We propose that ritonavir induces ABCA1 expression in THP-1 macrophages through LXRalpha. The increase in ABCA1 and other cholesterol efflux mediators, such as CYP27, may compensate CD36 induction. Therefore, we suggest that the net effect of ritonavir on macrophages in the absence of lipoproteins is not clearly proatherogenic.
Alzheimer''s disease (AD), the most common form of dementia, is a major health problem with increasing prevalence associated with the increase in life span. Unfortunately, drugs currently used to ...treat this disorder have only modest therapeutic efficacy. Therefore, there is an urgent need to develop new pharmacological strategies to prevent or delay the onset of AD. As it has been suggested that there is a link between cholesterol and the development of AD, one such strategy could be the inhibition of cholesterol synthesis using HMG-CoA reductase inhibitors (statins). In addition to their cholesterol-lowering properties, statins exert multiple lipid-independent (pleiotropic) effects that may explain some of their beneficial actions. The aim of this article is to summarize the current knowledge on the effects of statins on AD and the mechanisms involved, based on data from in vitro, in vivo and clinical studies, and to provide an overview of the future perspectives in this field.
Fundamentos: Las lesiones no intencionadas son la primera causa de morbimortalidad infantil, los Servicios de Urgencias pueden ser un buen lugar para incidir en su prevención, orientando y ...anticipando situaciones de riesgo. El objetivo de este trabajo fue evaluar en Urgencias el conocimiento y la actitud de los padres-cuidadores de los niños de uno a cuatro años en seguridad infantil y valorar si existen diferencias en función de si el niño ha sufrido una lesión no intencionada (LNI) o no. Métodos: Estudio descriptivo transversal a través de encuestas realizado en un Servicio de Urgencias durante 44 días escogidos aleatoriamente entre dos periodos (10/2015-01/2016 y 10/2016-01/2017). Se encuestó a los padres-cuidadores de los niños entre uno y cuatro años. Por cada niño con LNI (GRUPO1) se incluyeron dos con otro motivo de consulta (GRUPO2). Se utilizó la encuesta de Seguridad de Framingham. Se consideró que el conocimiento y actitud de los padres-cuidadores era adecuado si la proporción de respuestas correctas fue≥75%. Se analizaron los datos con el programa estadístico SPSS v 22.0 para Windows. Resultados: Respondieron a la encuesta 499 padres-cuidadores; 170 pertenecían al GRUPO1 y 329 al GRUPO2. La mediana de respuestas correctas fue de 27/39(69,2%) en ambos grupos. Las variables donde se detectaron más respuestas incorrectas fueron: falta de seguridad frente a un incendio (409;82%) y ausencia de rejas en las ventanas (402;80,6%). Cuarenta y cinco (26,5%) padres-cuidadores del GRUPO1 y 94(28,6%) del GRUPO2 contestaron correctamente≥75% a las preguntas (p=0,620); por edad de los niños, el 34,8% de los padres-cuidadores de los de un año, el 26,9% de los de dos, el 26,8% de los de tres y el 17,9% de los de cuatro (p=0,007). Conclusiones: El conocimiento de las familias para prevenir LNI fue bajo, tanto si éste era o no, el motivo de consulta. Se detectó una relajación en las medidas de seguridad al aumentar la autonomía de los niños.
Alzheimer ’s disease (AD), the most common form of dementia, is a major health problem with increasing prevalence associated with the increase in life span. Unfortunately, drugs currently used to ...treat this disorder have only modest therapeutic efficacy. Therefore, there is an urgent need to develop new pharmacological strategies to prevent or delay the onset of AD. As it has been suggested that there is a link between cholesterol and the development of AD, one such strategy could be the inhibition of cholesterol synthesis using HMG-CoA reductase inhibitors (statins). In addition to their cholesterol-lowering properties, statins exert multiple lipid-independent (pleiotropic) effects that may explain some of their beneficial actions. The aim of this article is to summarize the current knowledge on the effects of statins on AD and the mechanisms involved, based on data from
,
and clinical studies, and to provide an overview of the future perspectives in this field.
