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Echocardiographic diagnosis of pulmonary embolism in childhood.

Pulmonary embolism is a rare problem in the pediatric age group. As in adults, symptoms include tachypnea, chest discomfort, and hypoxia, but the index of suspicion in making this diagnosis in children is low. This report confirms the usefulness of two-dimensional and Doppler echocardiography in the diagnosis of pulmonary embolism, regardless of patient age. Causes of hypercoagulable states in children are also briefly discussed.

Child↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Neuron-enriched second trimester human cultures: growth factor response and in vivo graft survival.

Grafts of first trimester fetal tissue show limited survival and integration in the adult CNS. Alternative grafting strategies have been sought for treatment of neurodegenerative disease. We have developed cultures of human second trimester fetal tissues to study neuronal differentiation. Grafted into the SCID mouse striatum, aggregates of these cultures formed neuron-rich xenografts for at least 8 months. We examined the influence of various neurotrophic factors, including basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF), brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), transforming growth factor-beta 1 (TGF-beta1), and hepatocyte growth factor (HGF), on the growth and differentiation of neuronal and glial cell populations. BDNF promoted the survival and differentiation of second trimester neurons whereas bFGF exhibited a strong proliferative effect on precursors and the astroglial population. Our data suggest that second trimester human fetal cultures contain neuroprogenitor cells that can be directed to the neuronal lineage. This process may be amplified by treatment with BDNF, which we hypothesize could improve the long-term in vivo survival of neuron-enriched grafts.

Animals↗