Biomedical subjects
Publications and source records attributed to D L Levin.
Bacterial corneal ulcers can destroy vision if not treated early. Two seriously ill patients developed corneal infections with Pseudomonas aeruginosa while in the pediatric intensive care unit. In one patient the eye was destroyed. The other patient was treated successfully, but early intervention was crucial.
Mortality and incidence rates for pancreatic cancer in the United States were examined by various demographic characteristics. Disease rates have continued to increase over time but at a much slower pace than in earlier years. Most recently available rates for blacks were significantly higher than for whites and rates for males of each race were higher than for females. Income and education levels had little influence on incidence rates among either blacks or whites. Incidence rates were not significantly higher in urban as compared with rural areas of Iowa and Colorado. The two-year survival rate for pancreatic cancer was about 5% in recent years and did not vary significantly by race or sex. Smoking and diabetes, the two risk factors most consistently associated with the pancreatic cancer, explain only a small proportion of the disease. Much epidemiologic work remains to be done.
Two children are described with the Sweet syndrome (acute febrile neutrophilic dermatosis), a rare skin disorder usually seen in middle-aged women. Typical features include spiking fever, neutrophilic leukocytosis, raised painful erythematous plaques and nodules reflecting a cutaneous dermal infiltrate composed of polymorphonuclear leukocytes and rapid resolution in response to systemically administered corticosteroid. The eruption is believed to represent a hypersensitivity reaction to antecedent infection or concurrent malignancy.
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The study of the extent and basis of gene-enzyme variation has long been a principal concern of population genetics. Numerous surveys have indicated considerable amounts of genetic variation detectable in natural populations, with few exceptions. The variances of average heterozygosities (H) between species and among populations within species are large, prompting Lewontin to emphasize the importance of large gene sample sizes and Selander to encourage analysis of variation of homologous gene-enzyme systems when making species comparisons. We present here a comparative genetic analysis of electrophoretic variation at 57 homologous biochemical loci of cats, mice and men. The distribution of polymorphism among the sampled loci in the three species was nonrandom. A large group of sampled loci (60%) were monomorphic in all three species, whereas a second group (30%) of the loci were polymorphic in two or more species. This conservation of the tolerance of genetic polymorphism is apparently more a characteristic of a particular locus than of the vertebrate species or of the genome. The current hypotheses for classifying polymorphic and monomorphic loci in terms of physiological and physical enzyme characteristics have been re-examined.
Although a right-to-left shunt via a patent ductus arteriosus is one criterion for the diagnosis of persistent pulmonary hypertension of the newborn infant, it cannot be demonstrated by simultaneous pre- and postductus arteriosus blood oxygen tensions in many infants with the clinical syndrome. In animals, exposure of the fetal ductus arteriosus to salicylates causes contriction and results in pulmonary hypertension. We postulated that maternal ingestion of salicylates and premature closure of the ductus arteriosus may explain why some infants with PPHN do not have right-to-left ductus shunts. Therefore, we studied serum salicylate levels in six groups of infants: I, normal infants' cord blood (0.73 +/- 0.44 mg/dl, N = 20); Ia, normal infants at 24 to 36 hours of age (0.08 +/- 0.1 mg/dl, N = 5): II, other cardiopulmonary diseases with no right-to-left ductus shunt (2.08 +/- 1.74 mg/dl, N = 26); III, other cardiopulmonary diseases and right-to-left ductus shunt (2.34 +/- 1.70 mg/dl, delta Pao2 70 +/- 71 mm Hg, N = 6); IV, PPHN and right-to-left ductus shunt (1.86 +/- 1.51 mg/dl, delta Pao2 39.6 +/- 58.9 mm Hg, N = 5); V, PPHN without right-to-left ductus shunt (7.77 +/- 5.18 mg/dl, delta Pao2 2.2 +/- 1.5 mm Hg, N = 6). Serum salicylate levels were significantly greater (P less than 0.01) in infants with PPHN without right-to-left ductus shunt, indicating that the ductus arteriosus may have been closed prematurely. No other factor, including serum bilirubin, amikacin, ampicillin, or furosemide levels, could be found to account for the difference in serum salicylate levels. Premature closure of the ductus arteriosus secondary to maternal ingestion of salicylates may be one cause of PPHN and may explain the absence of right-to-left ductus shunting in some infants with the clinical syndrome.
Administration of intravenous fluid to infants and children requires an understanding of the normal expenditure of water and electrolytes by the healthy child and the effects of specific illnesses on water and electrolyte turnover.
A 5-day-old girl with congenital absence of skin, a single placental artery, and infarction of the placenta is described. These findings support a vascular etiology and provide additional evidence for a degenerative, rather than an aplastic or traumatic, origin of absent skin in the newborn.
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Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
The prostaglandin synthetase inhibitor indomethacin was given orally or intravenously to pregnant ewes. This resulted in the fetal pulmonary to systemic arterial mean blood pressure difference across the ductus arteriosus rising significantly, presumably secondary to constriction of the ductus arteriosus. The pressure difference was due to pulmonary arterial hypertension, and not due to a fall in systemic arterial mean blood pressure. Fetal arterial blood gas tensions and pH values were normal throughout. In five experiments the pressure difference could be promptly but temporarily reversed by the administration of PGE1 into the fetal inferior vena cava. Indomethacin was present in fetal blood, and maternal plasma prostaglandin levels were suppressed. Indomethacin administration during pregnancy causes constriction of the fetal ductus arteriosus and fetal pulmonary arterial hypertension which, if severe, may cause rapid fetal death. It is possible that this mechanism may be one cause of persistent pulmonary hypertension or tricuspid insufficiency or both in the newborn infant.
The main pulmonary trunk was banded in four fetal sheep at 63--69 days of gestation. The fetuses were killed after they had developed progressive pulmonary stenosis at 98, 123, 134 and 135 days of gestation. The right lung of each animal was perfused with glutaraldehyde and serial sections followed microscopically. The medial width/external diameter ratios for fifth generation resistance vessels were significantly less (0.13) than those from six normal control lungs (0.16, p less than 0.001). In addition, the number of resistance vessels per cm2 lung tissue in the lungs of the animals with experimental pulmonic stenosis was less than in normal controls. The altered in utero hemodynamics with severe pulmonic stenosis results in thin-walled pulmonary arterial vessels. This may be caused by an increased blood oxygen tension of the blood perfusing the pulmonary circulation via reversed flow through the ductus arteriosus, or altered pulmonary arterial pressure characteristics in the pulmonary vessels distal to the obstructed pulmonary trunk.
Although electrocardiographic evidence of right ventricular hypertrophy is considered common in newborn infants with coarctation of the aorta, the reason for this finding is not well established. Investigations of the pulmonary vascular bed of these infants have resulted in variable findings, probably due to the differences in morphometric techniques, coexisting cardiac defects, and variable postnatal age at time of death. To study more carefully the pulmonary vascular bed, we produced coarctation of the aorta in fetal lambs at 103--126 days gestation. Twelve to 32 days later the fetuses were reoperated on and systemic and pulmonary arterial blood pressures, and arterial blood gas tensions were determined to be normal. At autopsy, juxtaductal coarctations extended a mean of 2.8 mm into the aortic lumen and occupied 9.5 mm of the aortic circumference. The fifth-generation pulmonary resistance vessels had increased medial width (p less than 0.01), decreased external diameter (p less than 0.001), and increased medial width/external diameter ratios (p less than 0.001) compared with vessels from control fetuses. The number of small muscular pulmonary vessels/cm2 lung tissue was significantly reduced (p less than 0.01) in the study animals compared with the control animals. These alterations of the pulmonary vascular bed were not due to fetal pulmonary arterial hypertension or fetal hypoxemia. These pulmonary vascular changes may explain the occurrence of pulmonary hypertension and right ventricular hypertrophy in newborn infants with coarctation of the aorta.
The prostaglandin synthetase inhibitor indomethacin was given orally or intravenously to pregnant ewes. This resulted in a significant rise in the fetal pulmonary-to-systemic arterial mean blood pressure difference across the ductus arteriosus, presumably secondary to constriction of the ductus arteriosus. In five experiments the pressure difference could be promptly but temporarily reversed by the administration of prostaglandin E1 (PGE1) into the fetal inferior vena cava. Fetal lungs from study and control animals were fixed by perfusion at measured pulmonary arterial mean blood pressure, and fifth-generation resistance vessels were studied. The medial width/external diameter ratio was significantly increased in the study vs the control lungs due to increased smooth muscle and decreased external diameter. In addition, study fetuses had acute degenerative myocardial changes in the tricuspid valve papillary muscles, the right ventricular free wall and the interventricular septum. Similar changes were not seen in control fetuses. Indomethacin administration during pregnancy causes constriction of the fetal ductus arteriosus, fetal pulmonary arterial hypertension, and right ventricular damage. If severe, this may cause rapid fetal death. If less severe, in the newborn infant, this mechanism may be one cause of persistent pulmonary hypertension due to vasoconstriction and increased pulmonary arterial smooth muscle and/or tricuspid insufficiency due to papillary muscle infarction.
Chronic pulmonary arterial hypertension was produced in six fetal lambs. In four (126 to 139 days' gestation) unilateral fetal renal artery constriction caused systemic arterial mean blood pressure elevations. In another fetus, constriction of the umbilical artery caused a systemic mean blood pressure elevation; in the sixth, partial occlusion of the ductus arteriosus caused isolated pulmonary arterial hypertension. The right lung of each fetus was perfused with fixative at the in vivo mean arterial pressure and the amount of smooth muscle in the fifth generation (resistance) vessels analyzed using the medial width/external diameter ratio. There was a significant increase in the medial width/external diameter ratio in the six experimental animals as compared to that in six normal fetuses. In separate fetuses the increased ratios were due to a decreased external diameter, increased smooth muscle, or both these factors. The total number of resistance vessels was counted in the right lung of each fetus and no significant difference from normal was observed. We postulate that either fetal systemic hypertension or constriction of the ductus arteriosus causes fetal pulmonary hypertension in utero and that this produces increased smooth muscle development in pulmonary arterial resistance vessels; this may be a pathogenic mechanism for the syndrome of persistent pulmonary hypertension of the newborn infant.