ABSTRACT
Objective To analyze the disease spectrum of patients admitted to the General Internal Medicine Unit at Peking Union Medical College Hospital, which is the first academic division of general internal medicine in the department of medicine within Chinese medical colleges and universities, and the value of general internal medicine unit in comprehensive hospitals. Methods A retrospective data review of patients admitted to the General Internal Medicine Unit from 2004 to 2008 was conducted from hospital information system and partially by chart review manually. Analysis of disease spectrum was performed thereafter. Results A total of 2593 patients were included in our study. It consisted of 1075 men and 1518women, with an average age of 45.1 years old. Forty point three percent of these patients were from Beijing,the local city, and the remaining 59.7% were from outside of Beijing. Sixty-four point nine percent (1683/2593)of these patients did not have a clear diagnosis on admission, including 758 fever of unknown origin (FUO) cases and 925 non-FUO cases. The final diagnostic rate of the FUO cases was 89. 2% [676/758, with the first three leading causes as diseases of the musculoskeletal system and connective tissue (29. 8%), certain infectious and parasitic diseases(26.3%), and neoplasm (14. 5%)] . The final diagnostic rate of the 928 non-FUO cases was 86. 8%(803/925), with the first three leading causes as musculoskeletal system and connective tissue(24.9%), neoplasm (15.5%), and diseases of blood and blood-forming organs(11.4%). Despite most diagnoses fitting into the above categories, the array of diseases was broad with as many as 550 discharge diagnoses from 2004 to 2008. Conclusions During 2004 -2008, there was a high proportion of cases that presented to the General Internal Medicine Unit at Peking Union Medical College Hospital with an unclear diagnosis, and the spectrum of diseases diagnosed was very broad. This kind of patient admitting model might not only benefit patients with no clear admission diagnosis and patients with multidisciplinary medical problems for whom it is usually difficult to be admitted by a specialty unit, but would also benefit medical students and residents by providing a good clinical medicine teaching base. These features show the value of general internal unit in comprehensive hospitals.
ABSTRACT
Objective To improve the anderstanding of clinical profile of primary plasma cell leukemia.Methods Case report and literature review.Results A rare case of nervous system relapse in primary plasma cell leukemia was reported.Six patients were identified from the literature.The type of immunoglobulin included IgG(3 patients),IgD(2 patients).Clinical manifestations of nervous system were variable.The average interval from initial diagnosis to the development of nervous system relapse was 16.5 months.Plasma cells were found in cerebrospinal fluid in 4 patients.The mean surviaval time was 6.7 months after nervous system relapse.Conlusion Nervous system relapse in primary plasma cell leukemia is rare with poor prognosis.