Pediatric malignancies presenting as a possible infectious disease

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The clinical, laboratory, and radiological features of malignancy can overlap with those of infection. The purpose of this study was to determine the findings in children who were initially thought to have an infectious disease but ultimately proved to have a malignancy.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The database of patients diagnosed with a malignancy in the Northern Alberta Children's Cancer Program (NACCP) January 1, 1993 to December 31, 2003 was merged with the database of inpatients referred to the infectious diseases service at the Stollery Children's Hospital and charts were reviewed on all patients referred to the infectious diseases consult service prior to the diagnosis of malignancy.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>An infectious diseases consultation for diagnosis was requested in 21 of 561 patients prior to the confirmation of malignancy, and 3 of these 21 patients had both infection and malignancy (leukemia (N = 13), lymphoma (N = 3), rhabdomyosarcoma (N = 1), Langerhan's cell histiocytosis (N = 1), fibrous histicocytosis (N = 1), ependymoma (N = 1), and neuroblastoma (N = 1). The most common reason for infectious diseases consultation was suspected muskuloskeletal infection (N = 9). A palpable or radiographically enlarged spleen was noted in 11 patients (52%). All but 2 patients had abnormal hematologic parameters while an elevated lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) occurred in 10 patients (48%). Delay of diagnosis because of investigation or therapy for an infectious disease occurred in only 2 patients.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>It is not common for treatment of pediatric malignancies to be delayed because infection is thought to be the primary diagnosis. However, pediatric infectious diseases physicians should consider malignancy in the differential diagnosis when they see patients with fever and bone pain, unexplained splenomegaly or abnormal complete blood cell counts. Other clues may include hepatomegaly or elevated LDH.</p

Diagnosis of irregularities in the robotized part mating process based on contextual recognition of contact states transitions

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to provide a method for the generation of information machines for part mating process diagnosis. Recognition of contact states between parts during robotized part mating represents a significant element of the system for active compliant robot motion. All proposed information machines for contact states recognition will recognize one of the possible contact states even when irregular events in the process occur, and the active motion planner will continue to send commands to robot controller according to the planned trajectory. Design/methodology/approach - The presented framework is based on the general theory of automata and formal languages. Starting from possible regular contact states transitions in part mating, the authors create an automaton for diagnostics, which, besides regular, accepts all irregular (observable and unobservable) process sequences. Findings - Contact states do not appear arbitrarily during regular processes, but in certain context. Theory of automata represents a solid basis for contextual recognition and diagnosis of irregularities in part mating. Research limitations/implications - The proposed methodology is elaborated and experimentally verified using an example of cylindrical part mating, and stick-slip effect as an observable irregularity. The future work will address the generation of diagnosers for other types of part mating tasks and extension of the set of observable irregularities. Practical implications - The process diagnosis increases the robustness of active compliant motion system. Originality/value - Although very important feedback information provider for active motion planner, part mating process monitoring was not frequently addressed in the past. In this paper, the authors propose a methodology for generation of part mating process diagnoser that is based on general automata theory

/STRU^NI RAD UDK 616.65-006.04-097:577.112 The significance of TPSA, free to total PSA ratio and PSA density in prostate carcinoma diagnostics

Prostate-specific antigen (PSA) is the one of the most valuable tumor markers for the early detection and management of prostate carcinoma, but not an ideal one because of poor specificity in the case of prostatic hypertrophy and other benign conditions. In order to overcome this drawback some other parameters as is free to total ratio (F/T) PSA and PSA density (PSAD) are introduced. It has been investigated in 60 patients, 18 of them are proved to be found prostate cancer and other 42 were identified as benign prostatic hyperplasia. Patients with CaP had TPSA median of 11.4 ng/ml and the others with benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) had 6.9 ng/ml. In these two groups there was statistical significant difference (p 0.01). By receiver operating characteristics curve (ROC) estimated cutoff for TPSA was 4.0 ng/ml with 95 % sensitivity, 30 % specificity and area covered by ROC was in amount of 0.76. Median F/T ratio for patients with prostate cancer was 0.10, and for benign prostatic hyperplasia patients it was 0.25.For these values there is also statistical difference (p). Using ROC cutoff for F/T PSA was determined at the value of 0.18 with sensitivity 95%, specificity 80 % and area under the curve (AUC) 0.93. Median for PSAD in the group with CaP was 0.38 and in the BPH group was 0.16. There was statistical significance within those two groups. In conclusion F/T PSA, PSAD and TPSA are valuable tumor markers in distinguishing patients with CaP ant those without with modestly raised TPSA. Also F/T PSA showed up as better marker than TPSA and PSAD in investigated group of patients. Key words: prostate carcinoma, benign prostatic hyperplasia, prostate specific antigen, PSA density, free to total PSA ratio rezim

/STRU^NI RAD UDK 616.62-006.04-089.844 Local Recurrence of Bladder Cancer after Cystectomy with Orthotopic Bladder Substitution and Ileal Conduit

Objective: To present the local recurrence rates after radical cystectomy for advanced bladder cancer and to compare them between patients with orthotopic neobladder and ileal conduit. Patients and methods: 97 patients with radical cystectomy were analyzed: 75 patients with orthotopic ileal neobladder, operated from 1985. to 2006, and 22 patients with ileal conduit, operated fro