Immune-mediated hemolysis after administration of human intravenous immunoglobulin in a dog: a case report

A 10-year-old spayed female Maltese presented with purpura and hematemesis. Initial laboratory evaluation revealed immune-mediated thrombocytopenia, but evidence of hemolytic anemia was not identified. Three milligrams of human intravenous immunoglobulin (hIVIG) was administered for 3 hours following prednisolone and mycophenolate mofetil. A pale mucous membrane was identified, and the packed cell volume decreased by 3%. Blood film examination revealed significant spherocytosis with auto-agglutination. Blood transfusions and immunosuppression were continued for 4 days, and hIVIG was discontinued. This report describes a case of increased immune-mediated hemolysis after hIVIG administration, possibly due to new-onset immune-mediated hemolytic anemia or enhanced immunogenicity.

Color Change of Esthetic Restorative Materials for Different Staining and Whitening Dentifrices / 치위생과학회지

Background@#As the importance of the esthetic function of teeth increases, the use of esthetic restoration materials and whitening treatment are increasing. The purpose of this study was to investigate the color change of esthetic restoration materials upon using staining and whitening toothpaste. @*Methods@#Light curing (LC) packable composite resin, LC flowable resin, LC glass ionomer (GI), and self-curing GI specimens were colored in coffee or curry for three hours a day for seven days. After that, regular toothpaste, whitening toothpaste containing hydrogen peroxide, and whitening toothpaste containing activated charcoal were applied for three minutes three times a day for two weeks. Luminosity (L), chromaticity a (a), and chromaticity b (b) were measured using a spectrophotometer once a week. @*Results@#In the coffee-colored group, the change in L2 *a2 *b2 (E2 ) with time was significant (p=0.004), there was no difference for different toothpaste types (p=0.646), and there was significant difference (p＜0.001) for different esthetic restorative materials.The change of E2 in the curry-colored group was significant only for different esthetic restorative materials (p＜0.001). In the coffee-colored group, the L, a, and b values of the light-curing GI showed greater change than other materials after staining and one week after whitening, turning dark, red, and yellow. In the curry-colored group, L did not differ for different materials and times, and a and b showed the greatest difference in light-curing GI after staining and one and two weeks after whitening. @*Conclusion@#The use of whitening toothpaste for two weeks was not different from the use of general toothpaste in the removal of staining or whitening. Since light-curing GI is the most vulnerable to coloration, it is recommended that coloring by food chromogen should be explained in advance, before using light-curing GI for teeth restoration.

Recognition of Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals and Behavior to ReduceExposure to Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals in Cooking Staff Working atChild Care Center Located in Gyeonggi Province

Endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) are chemicals present in the environment that interfere with the normalhormone functions of various organisms and cause genetopathy, deformities, or cancer. This study surveyedthe awareness of EDCs with 242 cooking staff at 242 meal service facilities for children located in apart of Gyeonggi Province. To minimize infants’ exposure to EDCs, the subjects were provided with informationon EDCs for two months. The behavior of reducing exposure to EDCs was analyzed according tothe awareness of EDCs and work ethics. In addition, the effects before and after being provided with the informationwere evaluated. According to the results, the levels of awareness of EDCs and work ethics’ scoresof the cooking staff were high with 3.95 and 4.39 points, respectively, out of five points. In addition, a higherawareness of EDCs and a higher work ethics’ score were associated with an improved behavior of reducingexposure to EDCs (P＜0.05). The overall cooking and cleaning behavior for reducing exposure toEDCs showed improvement after providing information (P＜0.01). Therefore, these results suggest that it isimportant to provide continuous education to enhance the awareness of EDCs, work ethics, and behavior toreduce exposure to EDCs.

Organizing an in-class hackathon to correct PDF-to-text conversion errors of Genomics & Informatics 1.0

This paper describes a community effort to improve earlier versions of the full-text corpus of Genomics & Informatics by semi-automatically detecting and correcting PDF-to-text conversion errors and optical character recognition errors during the first hackathon of Genomics & Informatics Annotation Hackathon (GIAH) event. Extracting text from multi-column biomedical documents such as Genomics & Informatics is known to be notoriously difficult. The hackathon was piloted as part of a coding competition of the ELTEC College of Engineering at Ewha Womans University in order to enable researchers and students to create or annotate their own versions of the Genomics & Informatics corpus, to gain and create knowledge about corpus linguistics, and simultaneously to acquire tangible and transferable skills. The proposed projects during the hackathon harness an internal database containing different versions of the corpus and annotations.

Organizing an in-class hackathon to correct PDF-to-text conversion errors of Genomics & Informatics 1.0

This paper describes a community effort to improve earlier versions of the full-text corpus of Genomics & Informatics by semi-automatically detecting and correcting PDF-to-text conversion errors and optical character recognition errors during the first hackathon of Genomics & Informatics Annotation Hackathon (GIAH) event. Extracting text from multi-column biomedical documents such as Genomics & Informatics is known to be notoriously difficult. The hackathon was piloted as part of a coding competition of the ELTEC College of Engineering at Ewha Womans University in order to enable researchers and students to create or annotate their own versions of the Genomics & Informatics corpus, to gain and create knowledge about corpus linguistics, and simultaneously to acquire tangible and transferable skills. The proposed projects during the hackathon harness an internal database containing different versions of the corpus and annotations.

Characteristics and Safety of Cardiopulmonary Exercise Testing in Elderly Patients with Cardiovascular Diseases in Korea

PURPOSE: Clinical use of cardiopulmonary exercise tests (CPETs) is increasing in elderly patients with cardiovascular (CV) diseases. However, data on Korean populations are limited. In this study, we aimed to examine the characteristics and safety of CPET in an elderly Korean population with CV disease. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We retrospectively analyzed records of 1485 patients (older than 65 years in age, with various underlying CV diseases) who underwent CPET. All CPET was performed using the modified Bruce ramp protocol. RESULTS: The mean age of patients was 71.6±4.7 years with 63.9% being men, 567 patients aged 60–65 years, 818 patients aged 70–79 years, and 100 patients aged 80–89 years. The mean respiratory exchange ratio was 1.09±0.14. During CPET, three adverse cardiovascular events occurred (total 0.20%), all ventricular tachycardia. All subjects showed an average exercise capacity of 21.3±5.5 mL/kg/min at peak VO2 and 6.1±1.6 metabolic equivalents of task, and men showed better exercise capacity than women on most CEPT parameters. A significant difference was seen in peak oxygen uptake according to age group (65–69 years, 22.9±5.8; 70–79 years, 20.7±5.1; 80–89 years, 17.0±4.5 mL/kg/min, p<0.001). The most common causes for CPET termination were dyspnea (64.8%) and leg pain (24.3%), with higher incidence of leg pain in octogenarians compared to other age groups (65–69 years, 22.4%; 70–79 years, 24.6%; 80–89 years, 32.0%, p<0.001). CONCLUSION: CPET was relatively a safe and useful modality to assess exercise capacity, even in an elderly Korean population with underlying CV diseases.

Discrepancy between Self-Reported and Urine-Cotinine Verified Smoking Status among Korean Male Adults: Analysis of Health Check-Up Data from a Single Private Hospital / 가정의학회지

BACKGROUND: Enquiry into smoking status and recommendations for smoking cessation is an essential preventive service. However, there are few studies comparing self-reported (SR) and cotinine-verified (CV) smoking statuses, using medical check-up data. The rates of discrepancy and under-reporting are unknown. METHODS: We performed a cross-sectional study using health examination data from Healthcare System Gangnam Center, Seoul National University Hospital in 2013. We analyzed SR and CV smoking statuses and discrepancies between the two in relation to sociodemographic variables. We also attempted to ascertain the factors associated with a discrepant smoking status among current smokers. RESULTS: In the sample of 3,477 men, CV smoking rate was 11.1% higher than the SR rate. About 1 in 3 participants either omitted the smoking questionnaire or gave a false reply. The ratio of CV to SR smoking rates was 1.49 (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.38-1.61). After adjusting for confounding factors, older adults (≥60 years) showed an increased adjusted odds ratio (aOR) for discrepancy between SR and CV when compared to those in their twenties and thirties (aOR, 5.43; 95% CI, 2.69-10.96). Educational levels of high school graduation or lower (aOR, 2.33; 95% CI, 1.36-4.01), repeated health check-ups (aOR, 1.45; 95% CI, 1.03-2.06), and low cotinine levels of <500 ng/mL (aOR, 2.03; 95% CI, 1.33-3.09), were also associated with discordance between SR and CV smoking status. CONCLUSION: Omissions and false responses impede the accurate assessment of smoking status in health check-up participants. In order to improve accuracy, it is suggested that researcher pay attention to participants with greater discrepancy between SR and CV smoking status, and formulate interventions to improve response rates.

Breast Feeding Is Associated with Postmenopausal Bone Loss: Findings from the Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey / 가정의학회지

BACKGROUND: Postmenopausal osteoporosis is a common disease which can cause various morbidity and economic burden. Lactation is known to cause a decline in bone mineral density (BMD), but there are controversies on whether decreased BMD is fully recovered after lactation and whether lactation duration has an influence on postmenopausal BMD. This study was conducted to see whether breastfeeding is associated with postmenopausal bone loss using a highly representative sample of Korean population. METHODS: Retrospective cross sectional study was done using data collected from Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey V. The study outcome was BMD measured with dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry and divided into 2 groups: normal or low BMD (T score<-1), and breastfeeding duration was categorized into 4 groups (never, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd tertile). Logistic regression analysis was done to examine the association between lactation duration and BMD. RESULTS: Among 1,694 postmenopausal women (mean age, 63.5+/-9.1), 85.71% were in low BMD group. Compared to never breastfeeding group, postmenopausal women with longer than 79 months of breastfeeding duration are more likely to have low BMD (adjusted risk ratio [ARR]=1.24; 95% confidence interval, 1.17 to 1.32). As the duration of breastfeeding increases, ARR and risk difference for low BMD also increases (P for trend=0.008). CONCLUSION: The study results showed that total breastfeeding duration was associated with postmenopausal low BMD. All women planning on breastfeeding should be aware of its risks and should take adequate dietary calcium and vitamin D before, during, and after breastfeeding.

Retraction: Study for ReVersibility of Experimental Cholesteatoma Using Mongolian Gerbil / 대한이비인후과학회지

No abstract available.

Clinical Follow-up of Hearing-Impaired Infants Detected by Newborn Hearing Screening / 대한이비인후과학회지

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: When screened using cord blood, congenital hearing loss are detected more frequently than other congenital metabolic diseases such as phenylketonuria or congenital hypothyroidism. Newborn hearing screening is important because the early identification and intervention of neonatal hearing loss is beneficial for the language development. We aimed to analyze clinical characteristics including associated diseases and present hearing state, and the effects of speech rehabilitation in the hearing-impaired infants detected by newborn hearing screening program of Ajou University Hospital. SUBJECTS AND METHOD: Seventy nine hundred twelve neonates (6915 well babies and 997 NICU babies) were screened by transient evoked otoacoustic emission (TEOAE) and auditory brainstem response (ABR). Medical records of infants with bilateral hearing loss of more than 60 dB were evaluated, and they were further studied with temporal bone CT scan and follow-up hearing tests using ABR. The exon2 of the connexin26 gene was sequenced to detect the mutation. RESULTS: Fourteen of 7912 infants initially had bilateral hearing loss of more than 60 dB. Associated diseases were prematurity, hyperbilirubinemia, sepsis, low birth weight, chromosomal anomaly, cleft palate, congenital nevus, and congenital aural atresia. Three of 14 infants were revealed to have normal hearing after follow-up hearing test, which were associated with cleft palate, hyperbilirubinemia or prematurity. One of them had 235delC mutation of the connexin26, and the temporal bone CT scan demonstrated the finding of enlarged vestibular aqueduct syndrome (EVAS) in one infant. Two infants participated in the connected speech rehabilitation program and showed significant development of language. CONCLUSION: Follow-up hearing tests are important in case of failures of newborn hearing screening test. The establishment of auditory and speech rehabilitation program connected with newborn hearing screening is essential in treating hearing-impaired neonates.

Study for Reversibility of Experimental Cholesteatoma Using Mongolian Gerbil / 대한이비인후과학회지

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Epidermal characteristics of cholesteatoma such as invasion, migration, uncoordinated proliferation, and altered differentiation may arise as a result of defectiVe wound healing process, induction of preneoplastic transformation or genetic alteration. To date, a number of genes haVe been shown to be differentially regulated in cholesteatoma, which might be responsible for these clinical characteristics. HoweVer, it is still unclear whether these phenomena is only oVert when cholesteatoma is under specific conditions such as inflammation or infection. If these genetic alterations in the deVelopment of cholesteatoma are transient, the pathology of cholesteatoma may be reVersible. We hypothesized that once cholesteatoma is in the normal environment, the cellular or molecular pathology of cholesteatoma can return to normal epidermal characteristics. The aim of this study was to determine whether common molecular characteristics are reVersible or not after removal of inductive factors in aural cholesteatoma induced gerbils. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We induced canal ligation cholesteatoma using Mongolian gerbils. The treated group was untied and managed for 2 weeks. We examined differences between treated cholesteatoma and untreated cholesteatoma by using a TUNEL staining and immunohistochemical technique with proliferation markers (PCNA, cytokeratin 13/16). RESULTS: With PCNA and CK 13/16, untreated group showed positive staining in the suprabasal cells as well as in the basal cells, but the treated group showed weakly positive staining only in the basal cell layer. With TUNEL staining, positive cells increased more in the untreated group than in the treated group. CONCLUSION: These results encourage our belief that some cholesteatomas, especially cholesteatoma in early stages, might be managed with only minimal treatments such as control of inflammation and maintenance of adequate Ventilation.

A Clinical Study of Parapharyngeal Abscess / 대한이비인후과학회지

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Parapharyngeal infections are rare but they cause life-threatening complications such as mediastinitis, rupture or aneurysm of the internal carotid artery, internal jugular vein thrombophlebitis. So, until now, the recommended treatment of parapharyngeal abscess is early open surgical drainage. The purpose of this study is to review the clinical course and outcome of treatment in parapharyngeal abscess according to method of treatment. MATERIALS AND METHOD: A retrospective study was peformed on 34 cases with parapharyngeal abscess in patients admitted for deep neck infection during a 8-year period from June 1994 to January 2003. All had contrast-enhanced computed tomography (CT) imaging and had confirmation of an abscess in parapharyngeal space. RESULTS: All patients were treated with intravenous antibiotics, 19 cases (conservative group) were treated with antibiotics only or needle aspiration, 15 cases (surgical group) were treated with intraoral or external drainage. The mean period of hospitalization was 8.2 days in conservative group and 11.6 days in surgical group. There was no complication except the mediastinitis in one case of conservative group. Five patients required tracheotomy because of severe dyspnea. CONCLUSION: Neck CT scan is useful diagnostic tool to detect and establish treatment plan of parapharyngeal abscess. Parapharyngeal abscess may, in some cases, respond to antibiotics, become localized to parapharyngeal space and treated conservatively with no need for early open surgical drainage.

The Effect on Voice by Strap Muscle Cutting in Thyroidectomy / 대한내분비외과학회지

PURPOSE: Voice change after thyroidectomy has generally been the result of damage to the recurrent or superior laryngeal nerve. But many patients complain voice alteration without laryngeal nerve injury after thyroidectomy. The purpose of this study is to investigate whether strap muscle division results in any subjective or objective functional sequelae in voice, through long-term follow-up prospectively. METHODS: Twenty-two female patients who had undergone thyroid surgery between July 1998 and December 1999, were studied. The patients who were planned for neck dissection, who had benign laryngeal disease or vocal cord paresis, and whose vocal cord paresis were developed after thyroid surgery, were excluded from this study. Twelve patients had undergone thyroidectomy via retraction of strap muscle and ten patients had undergone thyroidectomy via cutting of strap muscle. For evaluation of voice, questionnaires for changes of voice, acoustics (fundamental frequency, jitter, shimmer, signal to noise ratio, noise to harmonic ratio, voice range), and aerodynamic (maximal phonation time) analyses were done. RESULTS: The subjective voice symptoms after thyroidectomy were disturbances of high pitch, singing, loud voice, and easy fatigue at phonation. There were no significant differences in voice parameters on acoustic and aerodynamic analyses between the strap muscle retraction group and the cutting group through long-term follow-up. CONCLUSION: We conclude that strap muscle division does not result in any subjective or objective functional problems in voice. We suggest that surgical division and reconstruction of these muscles should be employed routinely when operating on large, toxic or neoplastic glands.