Combined Nutcracker and Ehlers-Danlos Syndromes: A Case Report.

INTRODUCTION: Nutcracker syndrome refers to the clinical manifestations of left renal vein compression between the superior mesenteric artery and the abdominal aorta, causing urinary changes and low back pain. REPORT: A 44 year old woman presented with low back and pelvic pain. Following the diagnosis of nutcracker syndrome, she underwent endovascular treatment with renal vein stent placement; however, the patient continued to complain of pain. Further examinations revealed left renal vein compression by the portal vein. The patient underwent a second procedure; however, improvement was temporary and her pain returned. Further investigation revealed previously undetected nephroptosis and hyperelasticity. A diagnosis of Ehlers-Danlos syndrome made, possibly explaining the mobility of viscera and unusual compression of the left renal vein by the portal vein. CONCLUSION: Ehlers-Danlos syndrome can cause nutcracker syndrome and may give rise to visceral pain of mixed origin.

Machine learning in prediction of individual patient readmissions for elective carotid endarterectomy, aortofemoral bypass/aortic aneurysm repair, and femoral-distal arterial bypass.

OBJECTIVE: Early hospital readmissions have been rising and are increasingly used for public reporting and pay-for-performance. The readmission problem is fundamentally different in surgical patients compared with medical patients. There is an opportunity to intervene preoperatively to decrease the risk of readmission postoperatively. METHODS: A predictive model of 90-day hospital readmission for patients undergoing elective carotid endarterectomy, aortofemoral bypass/aortic aneurysm repair, and femoral-distal arterial bypass was developed using data from the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project State Inpatient Database for Florida State. The model training followed a nested resampling method with subsampling to increase execution speed and reduce overfitting. The following predictors were used: age, gender, race, median household income, primary expected payer, patient location, admission type, Elixhauser-van Walraven Comorbidity Index, Charlson comorbidity score, main surgical procedure, length of stay, disposition of the patient at discharge, period of the year, hospital volume, and surgeon volume. RESULTS: Our sample comprised data on 246,405 patients, of whom 30.3% were readmitted within 90 days. Readmitted patients were more likely to be admitted via emergency (47.2% vs 30%), included a higher percentage with a Charlson score greater than 3 (35.8% vs 18.7%), had a higher mean van Walraven score (8.32 vs 5.34), and had a higher mean length of hospital stay (6.59 vs 3.51). Endarterectomy was the most common procedure, accounting for 19.9% of all procedures. When predicting 90-day readmission, Shrinkage Discriminant Analysis was the best performing model (area under the curve = 0.68). Important variables for the best predictive model included length of stay in the hospital, comorbidity scores, endarterectomy procedure, and elective admission type. The survival analysis for the time to readmission after the surgical procedures demonstrated that the hazard ratios were higher for subjects who presented Charlson comorbidity score above three (2.29 (2.26, 2.33)), patients transferred to a short-term hospital (2.4 (2.23, 2.59)), home healthcare (1.64 (1.61, 1.68)), other type of facility (2.59 (2.54, 2.63)) or discharged against medical advice (2.06 (1.88, 2.26)), and those with greater length of stay (1.89 (1.86, 1.91)). CONCLUSION: The model stratifies readmission risk on the basis of vascular procedure type, which suggests that attempts to decrease vascular readmission should focus on emergency procedures. Given the current focus on readmissions and increasing pressure to prevent unplanned readmissions, this score stratifies patients by readmission risk, providing an additional resource to identify and prevent unnecessary readmissions.

Lipedema associado a obesidade, linfedema e insuficiência venosa: relato de um caso / Lipedema associated with obesity, lymphedema and venous insufficiency: case report

Contexto: O lipedema, apesar de prevalente, é uma condição mórbida subdiagnosticada. Descrição do caso: O presente artigo apresenta o caso de uma paciente de 80 anos com diversas comorbidades que possui episódios álgicos e pruriginosos constantes em membros inferiores, além de alterações dérmicas, associadas a dificuldade de deambulação e flexão de pernas, bem como presença constante de hematomas, equimoses e sensação de peso constante em membros inferiores. Discussão: O lipedema é geralmente confundido com seus principais diagnósticos diferenciais, como, por exemplo, o linfedema e a obesidade. Conclusões: Torna-se, portanto, essencial o conhecimento fisiopatológico e clínico da doença, a fim de que seja feito um diagnóstico preciso e, deste modo, instalada uma terapêutica adequada.

Translation, cultural adaptation, and validation of a lipedema symptoms questionnaire.

BACKGROUND: Lipedema is characterized as abnormal bilateral deposition of fat in the buttocks and legs that may be accompanied by orthostatic edema in women. A questionnaire for assessment of lipedema symptoms has previously been published in German and English to assess treatment progress. OBJECTIVES: To translate, culturally adapt, and validate the lipedema symptoms assessment questionnaire for Brazilian Portuguese. METHODS: The process involved three translations and two back-translations performed by independent translators, followed by construction of a consensus version and adaptation according patients' comprehension. The questionnaire was converted into a digital version and administered to 56 volunteers and then administered to 154 patients from a vascular clinic and correlated with volume determined by segmental bioimpedance. RESULTS: The 20 pre-test patients were female and at least 90% of the interviewees were able to understand the questions in the final phase. Volunteers had a 96.4% rate of comprehension of the digital online version and a mean completion time of 4 minutes. In 154 patients, limb volume was positively correlated with intensity of symptoms, as assessed by the translated questionnaire, and 3 out of 15 questions were weakly correlated with educational level. CONCLUSIONS: The translated and culturally adapted Brazilian Portuguese version of the lipedema symptoms assessment questionnaire (QuASiL) is a practical tool that is easy and quick to administer and can be used in our population. Additional studies are still needed to assess the instrument's sensitivity as an aid for diagnosis of lipedema.

Hybrid surgery in excision of a Shamblin II glomus tumor.

Glomus tumors are rare benign neoplasms originating from paraganglionic cells of the neural crest developing in the adventitious layer of the vessel. They are nonencapsulated and highly vascularized. A 64-year-old female patient was identified with a hypervascularized glomus tumor measuring 5 cm, posterior to the left carotid bifurcation and contralateral carotid occlusion. We performed preoperative embolization via endovascular access followed by direct percutaneous puncture, guided by angiography, to fill the remaining area. After embolization, surgical excision of the tumor was performed with reduced bleeding and it was easier to find the cleavage planes to adjacent structures. At late follow-up, the patient is free from tumor recurrence. The tumor was classified as Shamblin II, measuring 4 to 6 cm with moderate arterial insertion. Through this double approach we observed a relative reduction in intraoperative bleeding and improved identification of the cleavage plane, facilitating excision and avoiding surgical clamping.