Circulatory, respiratory, pulmonary disorders

Epmyema thoracis is associated with high mortality ranging between 6% to 24%. The incidence of empyema is increasing in both children and adults; the cause of this surge is unknown. Most cases of empyema complicate community- or hospital-acquired pneumonia but a proportion results from iatrogenic causes or develops without pneumonia....

Hereditary Haemorrhagic Telangiectasia (HHT), or Osler-Weber-Rendu syndrome is an uncommon autosomal dominant multi-organ condition of vascular dysplasias. We describe a 19 year old Indian female who presented with cerebral abscess secondary to paradoxical emboli from pulmonary arteriovenous malformations (PAVMs) associated with HHT. Cerebral, pulmonary, hepatic and gastrointestinal involvement can be...

Fluoroquinolone antibiotics are relatively new drugs in anti-tuberculosis (TB) treatment, with the potential to become the first new class of drugs to be recommended for routine treatment since rifamycins in the 1960s. Later generation fluoroquinolones, including levofloxacin, gatifloxacin, and moxifloxacin have been found to be safe and well-tolerated in observational...

The evaluation and management of pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) is a rapidly evolving area of subspecialty medicine requiring regular clinical updates. Most notably are changes in the World Health Organization diagnostic scheme whereby the clinician categorizes the correct type of pulmonary hypertension in order direct the most specific evaluation and...

Lung perfusion/ventilation was introduced as a means to minimize cardiopulmonary (CPB)-related pulmonary ischemic injury. Current results in the literature are divergent, and the role of gas exchange during lung perfusion/ventilation during CPB, remains undefined. This report details a) the technique of continuous lung perfusion/ventilation during CPB, b) provides initial observations,...

Introductory Editorial by Dr Karna Dev Bardhan

Ciclesonide is a novel inhaled corticosteroid (ICSs) approved in most countries for the management of persistent asthma. Although inhaled corticosteroids are first-line therapy in the treatment of asthma, long term use and high-doses of these products may result in significant side effects. When developing a new ICSs, the goal is...

Tigecycline is the first of a new class of antibiotics named glycylcyclines and is active in vitro against a variety of gram-positive and gram-negative organisms, including nosocomial resistant pathogens such as vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus faecium, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, extended-spectrum β-lactamase-producing Enterobacteriaceae, and multidrug-resistant-Acinetobacter spp. This medication has been approved by the...

Arformoterol tartrate is a newly developed long-acting ssβ2-agonist with both acute and prolonged bronchodilator effects. It is formed of 2 isomers (R,R/R,R) which distinguishes it from the more commonly used racemic formoterol (R,R/S,S). The active isomer is the (R,R) and in vitro arformoterol may have more potent anti-inflammatory effects than...

This is a review article that discusses the role of sildenafil in pediatric pulmonary hypertension. The etiopathogenesis as well as prognosis for pediatric pulmonary hypertension (PH) differs from adults. The basic tenets of targeted management of PH however are similar. Sildenafil and other phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors play a very important role...

Tigecycline is a first-in-class glycylcycline, broad-spectrum, intravenous antibacterial developed to overcome the two major mechanisms of tetracycline resistance (ribosomal protection and efflux). The drug has been approved in US for community-acquired bacterial pneumonia in adults. In vitro, tigecycline had good activity against a range of Gram-positive, Gram-negative and atypical community-acquired...

Allergic rhinitis and asthma are common disorders effecting large percentages of the population of Western countries. There are multiple treatment options available for allergic rhinitis and asthma and stepwise approaches to therapy have been recommended. Montelukast is a cysteinyl leukotriene receptor antagonist that has been found to be effective both...

Gary J. NoelJohnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical Research and Development, LLC, Raritan, NJ, USA.AbstractCompleting its initial phases of drug development in the mid 1990s as the one of the first fluoroquinolones that could be used with confidence to treat respiratory tract infections, levofloxacin went on to become one of the most...

Michael E. Speer and Amy B. GoodBaylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX, USA.AbstractRecurrent upper respiratory infections caused by respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and other respiratory viruses occur throughout life. During the first 2 years of life, RSV infected children have up to a 40% risk of a lower respiratory tract...

M van den Berge, NHT ten Hacken, HAM Kerstjens and DS PostmaDepartment of Pulmonology, University Medical Center Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.Abstract  In recent years considerable insight has been gained in the optimal management of adult asthma. In asthma patients who have persistent symptoms despite the daily use of (a low...

Background: Pulmonary arterial pressure (PAP) varies considerably in heart failure (HF) despite similar degrees of left ventricular (LV) dysfunction. Bradykinin alters vascular tone and common variations in the kinin B2 receptor (BDKRB2) gene exists. We hypothesized that genetic variation in this receptor would influence PAP in HF. Methods: 131...

Objectives: Hemoptysis is an alarming symptom of underlying lung disease. Clinicians are often unsure how to deal with and follow up patients who have had a single episode of hemoptysis, especially if the cause remains unknown despite thorough examination, because a second, more severe episode of hemoptysis might occur despite...

Bhupinder Mann Respiratory department, West Middlesex University Hospital, Middlesex, London, England. Abstract Eosinophilic lung diseases represent a group of disorders in which lung infiltrates seen on a chest radiograph, may or may not be accompanied by peripheral blood eosinophilia. The causes are varied, and range from drug...

The Dahl salt-sensitive (S) rat is a model of genetically determined salt-sensitivity and insulin resistance. In fact, insulin resistance is an inherited genetic trait that precedes and eventually co-exists with salt-sensitive hypertension in Dahl S, but not salt-resistant (R) Dahl rats. Owing to the critical role of salt in accelerating...

José-Luis Pérez-Castrillón1,4, Manuel Gonzalez-Sagrado2,4, Marta Gonzalez-Rozas1, Maria Andres-Calvo1, Elena Izquierdo-Delgado1, Marcelino Mendo3, Daniel de Luis2,4 and Antonio Dueñas-Laita1 1Department of Medicine, University Hospital Rio Hortega University of Valladolid, Spain. 2Research Unit, University Hospital Rio Hortega University of Valladolid, Spain. 3Department of Radiology, University Hospital Rio Hortega University of Valladolid,...

Alecia Thompson and Vineet Bhandari Department of Pediatrics, Division of Perinatal Medicine, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06520. Abstract Bronchopulmonary dysplasia, or BPD, is a chronic pulmonary disorder of premature infants, commonly defined as having an oxygen requirement at 36 weeks postmenstrual age. It...

Paveljit S. Bindra, Francis E. Marchlinski and David Lin Electrophysiology Section, Division of Cardiology (Drs. Bindra, Marchlinski and Lin); University of Pennsylvania Health System. Abstract Context: Syncope is a commonly encountered by primary care physicians and cardiologists. Etiology is frequently not apparent, and patients may undergo unnecessary...

Terje Forslund1, Arvo Koistinen1, Jorma Anttinen2, Bodo Wagner3 and Marja Miettinen1 1Division of Nephrology, Department of Internal Medicine, 2Department of Pathology, 3Department of Anesthesiology and Intensive Care Central Finland Health Care District Hospital, Jyväskylä, Finland. Abstract We present a patient who had ingested sodium bicarbonate for treatment...

Tasbirul Islam1, George Hines2, Douglas S. Katz3, William Purtil4 and Francis Castiller5 1Fellow, Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Winthrop-University Hospital, Mineola, NY, USA. 2Director, Department of Vascular Surgery, Winthrop-University Hospital, Mineola, NY, USA. Professor of Clinical Surgery, State University of New York at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, NY,...

John Y. C. Tsang1, Wayne J. E. Lamm2, Blazej Neradilek3, Nayak L. Polissar3 and Michael P. Hlastala2 1James Hogg iCAPTURE Research Laboratory, Division of Critical Care Medicine, Department of Medicine, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, B.C., Canada. 2Departments of Physiology and Biophysics and of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle,...

Carmelle V. Remillard and Jason X.-J. Yuan Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093-0725. Abstract Demographic and hemodynamic data from patients with idiopathic pulmonary arterial hypertension (IPAH) and chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension...

Sandra Reichert1, Raymond Gass2, Christian Brandt3 and Emmanuel Andrès4 1Ph.D., e-health UTBM student, Alcatel-Lucent, Chief Technical Office, Strasbourg, France. 2Technical Academy Fellow, Alcatel-Lucent, Chief Technical Office, Strasbourg, France. 3M.D., Head of the Cardiology Department, Clinique Médicale B, CHRU Strasbourg, Strasbourg, France. 4M.D., Ph.D., Head of...

Mari Terashima, Hiroshi Kataoka, Hirosei Horikawa, Hiroyuki Nakagawa1, Toshiaki Taoka1, Masanori Matsumoto2, Kozue Saito, Kimihiko Kichikawa1 and Satoshi Ueno From the Department of Neurology, Nara Medical University, Kashihara, Nara, Japan. 1The Department of Radiology, Nara Medical University, Kashihara, Nara, Japan. 2The Department of Blood Transfusion Medicine, Nara Medical University,...