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Reactivation of Chagas' myocarditis during therapy of Hodgkin's disease.

A 46-year-old female patient with chronic Chagas' myocarditis without heart failure was submitted to chemotherapy because of Hodgkin's disease. During treatment the frequency of polymorphic ventricular extrasystoles raised and the patient died by a sudden cardiac arrest. Autopsy revealed chronic Chagas myocarditis with an acute exacerbation. Nests of amastygotes with a density of up to 14 pseudocysts/cm2 were found in the myocardium, although restricted to the septum and left ventricular posterolateral wall. Extensive histologic examination did not reveal parasites in other locations. This favors the concept of a localized exacerbation of Chagas' disease due to immunosuppression developing from a persistent parasitic focus in the heart. Although this reactivation during chemotherapy of malignant disease is rarely reported in literature, a careful monitoring of patients with positive Chagas' serology during chemotherapy is recommended.

Antineoplastic Combined Chemotherapy Protocols↗

PubMedDate not supplied

[Malignant mesothelioma of the pleura with etiological association to asbestos: report of 3 clinical cases].

UNLABELLED: Diffuse Malign Mesotheliomas (DMM) has a low background prevalence. High incidences of this tumor have been related to asbestos exposure in the past. PURPOSE: To describe and discuss three clinical cases treated in our hospital, in which precise histopathologic diagnosis was made, and detailed occupational and environmental histories were taken, trying to identify in their past some kind of asbestos exposure. METHODS: Three cases of DMM are described. Diagnosis was confirmed by histochemical analysis and electronmicroscopy. Detailed occupational and environmental histories were taken from subjects and their families, searching for past contact with asbestos. RESULTS: The cases were diagnosed in a short period of time (two years), in a region of the country where many asbestos cement plants are located since the mid sixties. Skillful histological procedures were used. From these cases we found out that one had a twelve months period of exposure, 24 years before, in one of those plants. Another patient had an exposure for three years, as a bystander, in the same plant (also 24 years before) and a third patient was contaminated by asbestos brought home by his father in the 1950s (latency period of 30 years). All cases were histochemically studied and diagnosis confirmed by the presence of microvilli at electronmicroscopic examination. CONCLUSIONS: These three cases seem to confirm the existence of the epidemiologic association with asbestos exposure in our country. Definition of diagnosis criteria, centralization of cases registry and the necessity of more attention to this kind of asbestos related disease are discussed and stressed, as many new cases like those described are thought to occur in the near future, as the latency period of the disease seems to match with that of industrial asbestos manipulation in Brazil.

Adult↗