Recovery of acute renal failure following bilateral renal artery angioplasty and stenting.

Atherosclerotic renovascular disease commonly coexists with chronic kidney disease, and its optimal management remains unsettled. In this case report, we describe a 75-year-old woman with chronic kidney disease and critical atherosclerotic bilateral renal artery stenosis, who presented with a hypertensive emergency and developed acute renal failure following antihypertensive treatment. Bilateral percutaneous transluminal renal angioplasties (PTRA) with stent placement were performed and resulted in immediate recovery of renal function. The existing literature on this impressive response to PTRA is reviewed and discussed.

Apolipoprotein E genotypes in offspring with a positive and negative family history of premature myocardial infarction.

Apolipoprotein E (apo-E) allele and genotype frequencies were evaluated in offspring with positive (MI-offspring) and negative (control-offspring) parental history of myocardial infarction (MI). The apo-E allele frequencies in MI- and control-offspring were as follows: epsilon2: 9.04 and 2.08% (p < 0.02), epsilon3: 84.04 and 87.5%, epsilon4: 6.91 and 10.41%, respectively. The frequencies of the E2-genotypes were significantly lower in offspring of controls (4.2%, 17.0%, respectively, p < 0.03). The epsilon2-allele is associated with raised plasma triglyceride concentrations in subjects on a diet high in saturated fat. We therefore hypothesize that offspring carrying an epsilon2-allele are predisposed to develop disturbance of plasma triglyceride metabolism when exposed to a traditional Slovak high-fat diet and/or weight gain, resulting in altered lipid levels and increased predisposition to atherosclerosis.

[Color determination in dental ceramics]. / Farbbestimmung bei Dentalkeramiken.

Determining the appropriate color of an esthetic restoration is an important step in dental treatment. In this study instead of a shade guide the validity of a recently available objective colorimeter Castor has been investigated. A porcelain-fused-to-metal porcelain (PFM) (Biodent B2), the sinter-porcelain Mark II and the glass-porcelain Dicor have been spectrometrically studied, as well as a Vita shade guide. The Castor equipment has been used for all measurements. The lightness (L*) of the PFM porcelain was not altered by the glaze firing, whereas the red-green-values (a*) tended towards red and the blue-yellow-values towards blue. Total color value (E*) and lightness (L*) of Mark II and Dicor decreased with rising thickness of the samples. At and above a thickness of 1.5 mm, the background had only marginal influence on the L*a*b*-values. It was noticed, that the order by decreasing lightness within the shade guide did not meet official manufacturer declarations, whereas color intensity correlated evidently with the specification. The Castor equipment for color determination is an interesting innovation in dentistry. For the first time and in an economic reasonable frame it permits objective evaluation of color characteristics, such as lightness (L*), red-green (a*) and yellow-blue (b*).