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Biomedical subjects

W R Thompson

Publications and source records attributed to W R Thompson.

115 records · Page 7Linked to original sources
PubMed1965

On the determination of treponeme immobilizing potency of weakly reactive sera and its suggested interpretation.

Methods previously developed for determination of the TPI potency of strongly reactive sera have required modification to permit confidence in estimating potency in weakly reactive sera so as to correct for apparent blank reactivity and for possible inhibition by other serum constituents when a high enough serum concentration is used to permit detection of TPI activity. The intrinsic or blank potency (w') and the relative sensitivity (f) in the presence of a given amount of specimen serum are estimated separately, the latter through use of an internal standard by adding a convenient definite amount of standard serum. A primary aim of this study was to find what value of potency (p) would not be exceeded, or rarely so, by reactions of sera that had previously been evaluated as "negative" on a crude qualitative basis; it seems that p should be 1 or less for all such specimens. Those rated previously as "positive" appear almost always to have p greater than 3. Those with p in the interval from 1 to 3 indicate a need for further tests, preferably with fresh specimens.

Treponema Immobilization Test↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Automated cardiac auscultation for detection of pathologic heart murmurs.

Experienced cardiologists can usually recognize pathologic heart murmurs with high sensitivity and specificity, although nonspecialists with less clinical experience may have more difficulty. Harsh, pansystolic murmurs of intensity grade > or = 3 at the left upper sternal border (LUSB) are likely to be associated with pathology. In this study, we designed a system for automatically detecting systolic murmurs due to a variety of conditions and examined the correlation between relative murmur intensity and likelihood of pathology. Cardiac auscultatory examinations of 194 children and young adults were recorded, digitized, and stored along with corresponding echocardiographic diagnoses, and automated spectral analysis using continuous wavelet transforms was performed. Patients without heart disease and either no murmur or an innocent murmur (n = 95) were compared to patients with a variety of cardiac diagnoses and a pathologic systolic murmur present at the LUSB (n = 99). The sensitivity and specificity of the automated system for detecting pathologic murmurs with intensity grade > or = 2 were both 96%, and for grade > or = 3 murmurs they were 100%. Automated cardiac auscultation and interpretation may be useful as a diagnostic aid to support clinical decision making.

Adolescent↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Antibody-mediated red blood cell agglutination resulting in spontaneous echocardiographic contrast.

Spontaneous echocardiographic contrast is well reported in states of low flow and low shear stress, and the primary blood component involved has been reported as red blood cells via rouleaux formation. This report describes the occurrence of spontaneous echocardiographic contrast from a unique mechanism of IgM-mediated red blood cell agglutination and describes the clinical sequelae.

Anemia, Hemolytic, Autoimmune↗