[Effect of lumbar peridural analgesia on the evolution of the number of delivery-associated operations]. / Der Einfluss der lumbalen periduralen Analgesie auf die Entwicklung der Zahl geburtsbeendender Operationen.

The authors analyse the obstetric material of ten years of their institute in terms of the rate of delivery-completing operations. Lumbar peridural analgesia was introduced in the fourth year of the period under scrutiny. In the course of ten years we delivered 16,582 patients. 2,797 parturients of them were given peridural analgesia. In spite of the widespread use of this method of pain control during labor, the rate of vaginal operative deliveries in percentage terms did not change. The result corroborates the authors' assumption that an increase in the number of obstetric vaginal operations is not a necessary concomitant of lumbar peridural analgesia.

Composition of tobaccos from countries with high and low incidences of lung cancer. I. Selenium, polonium-210, Alternaria, tar, and nicotine.

Tobaccos from countries with high and low incidences of lung cancer were analyzed. Tobacco concentrations of polonium-210 were similar in cigarettes from high- and low-incidence countries, as were levels of cigarette smoke tar and nicotine. Tobaccos from low-incidence countries had significantly lower Alternaria spore counts. Mean selenium concentrations of tobaccos from the high-incidence countries (0.16 +/- 0.05 micrograms/g) were significantly lower than those of tobaccos from the low-incidence countries (0.49 +/- 0.22 micrograms/g).

Changes of plasma renin and renal renin concentration in HgCl2 induced acute renal failure in rats.

Acute renal failure (ARF) was produced by the single intraperitoneal injection of 3 mg/kg mercuric chloride (HgCl2) in male Wistar rats. Immediately after, and in the 1st, 3rd, 6th, 24th and 48th hour after HgCl2 administration the following variables were monitored: plasma renin concentration (PRC), renal renin concentration (RRC) blood-urea nitrogen (BUN), plasma sodium (PNa), plasma creatinine (PCr) concentrations and haematocrit (Ht). Haematocrit and PNa increased during the first hour and returned to the control value in the 3rd hour. Thereafter, their level remained unchanged. Plasma renin concentration increased threefold during the first six hours after the HgCl2 injection, however, by the 48th hour it returned to the control value. In the first 24 hours of ARF, RRC remained unchanged. However, by the 48th hour its level increased four times the control value. After mercury injection BUN and PCr increased progressively. We were not able to establish any significant correlation between the changes of PRC and BUN. A gradual increase of RRC was observed in the course of ARF.

Mycotoxicosis: toxic fungi in tobaccos.

Cigarette, cigar, and pipe tobaccos contain Alternaria spores and dematiaceous mycelia, with cigarette tobaccos being more heavily laden. A smoke aerosol generated from hay on which the fungus had been cultured caused, among other pathologic changes, pulmonary emphysema in mice.