Disease evolution of patients with mycosis fungoides--a report of 30 cases

Mycosis fungoides is the most common disease of the primary cutaneous T-cell lymphoma group. This is a retrospective study to evaluate the outcome of 30 patients with mycosis fungoides who were followed up for at least 3 years, 18 of them followed for 5 years and 9 of them followed for 7 years. A total of 10 patients achieved a sustained remission, 2 patients achieved a remission but then relapsed and three patients died from lymphoma-related death. It is concluded that the majority of the patients with T1 or T2 stage MF usually have a good prognosis. As a rule, those who do progress further in the disease have advanced stages at the moment of the diagnosis; the disease progression occurring during the first 3-5 years after diagnosis.

Carnitine supplementation in diphtheria.

We studied the effect of carnitine supplementation in patients with diphtheria. Six hundred and twenty five children of diphtheria received either DL-carnitine (100 mg/kg/day in two divided doses orally for four days), or no carnitine, in addition to the routine treatment for diphtheria. The patients receiving carnitine (n = 327) and controls (n = 298) were matched for age, sex, duration of symptoms, grade of toxemia and immunization status. Patients receiving carnitine showed a significant reduction in incidence of myocarditis as compared to controls (p = 0.001). Cases with myocarditis receiving carnitine therapy showed a significant reduction in mortality as compared to controls (p < 0.001). In view of a significant decline in incidence and mortality of myocarditis in cases of diphtheria, we recommended that all cases with diphtheria should receive carnitine supplementation.

Contribuição da isoenzima MB da creatinafosfoquinase para o diagnóstico da miocardite diftérica / MB creatine kinase isoenzymes for the diagnosis of diphtheric myocarditis

Foi medida a atividade da isoenzima MB da creatinafosfoquinase (CPK-MB) em 124 pacientes com diagnostico de difteria, e estudada a correlacao de suas alteracoes com a evolucao clinica, eletrocardiografica e radiologica, bem como com os indices de letalidade e ocorrencia de sequelas cardiacas na alta. A incidencia total de miocardite foi de 75,8%.A elevacao isolada da CPK-MB ocorreu em 20 pacientes, possibilitando, assim, o diagnostico de formas subclinicas em 15,2% do total de casos de miocardite. Niveis normais de atividade da CPK-MB mostraram-se associados a baixos indices de complicacoes, enquanto que atividades superiores a 20 U/l estiveram associados a altos indices de letalidade e presenca de sequelas cardiacas na alta. A medida da atividade da CPK-MB pode ser usada como ensaio enzimatico para deteccao de dano miocardico na difteria, aumentando a sensibilidade diagnostica e conferindo valor prognostico