Massive subcutaneous emphysema after carbon dioxide mesotherapy.

UNLABELLED: The authors report the observation of a 43-year-old woman with severe pain on her right upper abdominal quadrant. Differential diagnoses included acute cholecystitis, spontaneous pneumothorax, perforated appendicitis and a recidive of renal calculus. CT-scan showed a huge subdermal gas bubble along her right flank and anterior abdominal wall up to the submammary fold. Only at this point, the patient admitted to have undergone a carboxytherapy procedure on both thighs one day before onset of pain in a paramedical facility. As some of the injection trajects were still patent on CT-scan, she received prophylactic antibiotic coverage. Though there was a complete resorption of gas after 10 days, dysesthesias and muscle contracture persisted for 3 weeks. To the authors' knowledge this migration and coalescence of injected gas in a single bubble has not been previously reported. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE V: This journal requires that authors assign a level of evidence to each article. For a full description of these Evidence-Based Medicine ratings, please refer to the Table of Contents or the online Instructions to Authors http://www.springer.com/00266 .

Helicobacter pylori and probiotics.

Helicobacter pylori infection, a highly prevalent pathogen, is a major cause of chronic gastritis and peptic ulcer and a risk factor for gastric malignancies. Antibiotics-based H. pylori eradication treatment is 90% effective. However, it is expensive and causes side effects and antibiotic resistance. Probiotics could present a low-cost, large-scale alternative solution to prevent or decrease H. pylori colonization. A literature search of the MEDLINE database (1966-2006) has been performed selecting all in vitro, animal, and human fully published English-language studies dealing with H. pylori and probiotics. Probiotics had an in vitro inhibitory effect on H. pylori. Animal studies demonstrated that probiotic treatment is effective in reducing H. pylori-associated gastric inflammation. Seven of 9 human studies showed an improvement of H. pylori gastritis and decrease in H. pylori density after administration of probiotics. The addition of probiotics to standard antibiotic treatment improved H. pylori eradication rates (81% vs. 71%, with combination treatment vs. H. pylori-eradication treatment alone; chi(2)test: P=0.03). Probiotic treatment reduced H. pylori therapy-associated side effects (incidence of side effects: 23% vs. 46%, with combination therapy vs. H. pylori-eradication treatment alone; chi(2)test: P=0.04). No study could demonstrate the eradication of H. pylori infection by probiotic treatment. So long-term intake of products containing probiotic strains of probiotics may have a favorable effect on H. pylori infection in humans, particularly by reducing the risk of developing disorders associated with high degrees of gastric inflammation.

Absence of nocturnal acid breakthrough in Helicobacter pylori-positive subjects treated with twice-daily omeprazole.

BACKGROUND: Proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) taken twice daily do not effectively control night-time intragastric pH; nocturnal acid breakthrough (NAB) (arbitrarily defined as intragastric pH < 4 lasting longer than 1 h) occurs in more than 75% of patients. The effectiveness of PPIs depends rather on the Helicobacter pylori status. OBJECTIVES: To investigate the effectiveness of two regimens of omeprazole in H. pylori-positive subjects as well as the occurrence of NAB. PATIENTS: Fifteen otherwise healthy H. pylori-positive subjects participated in this randomized, crossover, double-blind study. METHODS: Night-time intragastric pH-metry was performed before (baseline) and on day 7 of two treatment courses with omeprazole (1 x 20 mg and 2 x 20 mg). A 14-day (minimum) wash-out period was respected between the two treatment courses. RESULTS: Group medians (10-90% confidence intervals) for night-time intragastric pH (22:30-06:30 h) were as follows: baseline, 2 (1-6.1); 1 x 20 mg, 5 (3.3-6.9; P < 0.001 versus baseline); instead of, 2 x 20 mg, 6.3 (4.9-7.1; P < 0.001 versus baseline, P = 0.02 versus omeprazole 1 x 20 mg). The percentage of time with intragastric pH < 3 was 65.4% during baseline (P < 0.05 versus both omeprazole regimens), 27% with once-daily omeprazole (P = 0.001 versus omeprazole 2 x 20 mg) and 0% with twice-daily omeprazole. NAB occurred in eight (53.3%) subjects with once-daily omeprazole and in no subject taking twice-daily omeprazole. CONCLUSIONS: In H. pylori-positive subjects, twice-daily omeprazole is highly effective in controlling nocturnal intragastric acidity. NAB does not occur in those subjects and there is no need to add bedtime H2-receptor antagonists to this regimen.

Epinephrine versus epinephrine plus fibrin glue injection in peptic ulcer bleeding: a prospective randomized trial.

BACKGROUND: Peptic ulcer bleeding remains a disease with considerable morbidity and mortality. Epinephrine is the most widely used endoscopic injection agent, but bleeding recurs in 20% of high-risk cases. Fibrin glue might be an ideal injection agent, based on its physiologic properties, despite its demanding injection technique and high cost. The aim of this study was to determine whether the injection of fibrin glue in combination with epinephrine improves outcome for patients at high risk of recurrent bleeding. METHODS: Patients were prospectively randomized to injection of epinephrine alone (n = 70) or epinephrine plus fibrin glue (n = 65). Endoscopy was repeated daily until the ulcer base was clean. All patients were treated with high-dose omeprazole. RESULTS: Initial hemostasis was 100% in both groups. There was no significant overall difference in rates of recurrent bleeding (24.3% and 21.5%, respectively, for epinephrine and epinephrine plus fibrin). When patients were stratified according to Forrest criteria, no significant difference could be found, although there was a trend toward less recurrent bleeding after fibrin injection of actively bleeding ulcers. There was no significant difference in the proportions of patients who required surgery (10% and 6%, respectively, for epinephrine and epinephrine plus fibrin). Mortality was the same (3%) in each group. CONCLUSIONS: Adding fibrin glue to epinephrine for injection treatment of bleeding peptic ulcers does not improve outcome. Fibrin glue might be of some value in selected cases.