A Case of Variant Angina Developing Transient Collateral Circulation During Vasospasm

Variant angina is characterized by spontaneous episodes of angina, usually occurring in the morning and having ST segment elevation on the electrocardiogram. However, in the case presented here, vasospasm and angina was shown by ergonovine without ST elevation. The patient was a 60-year-old man who presented with a 2-year history of frequent chest pain. There were no abnormalities in coronary angiography. When ergonovine (100 µg) was injected, total occlusion of the proximal right coronary artery was seen, without ST elevation at the electrocardiogram. The cause was collateral from left anterior descending artery to distal right coronary artery at the left coronary angiography. Therefore, in a patient with variant angina without ST elevation, a transient collateral circulation during vasospasm should be considered

Lupus Myocarditis Presenting as Acute Congestive Heart Failure: A Case Report

A young woman who had a delivery history 3 months previously presented with dyspnea and orthopnea. Initial findings of physical examination, chest radiography, and echocardiogram showed typical congestive heart failure with severe left ventricular (LV) dysfunction. At first, we considered peripartum cardiomyopathy because she had given birth to a baby 3 months previously. However, even though we massively tried conventional drug therapy for 10 days, the patient still remained with refractory heart failure. We performed additional laboratory studies such as complement level and autoantibodies, of which the results supported systemic lupus erythematosus. We could make the diagnosis of acute lupus myocarditis and treated her with corticosteroid. The symptoms were dramatically disappeared and LV function also improved

Sex-related impact on clinical outcomes of patients treated with drug-eluting stents according to clinical presentation: Patient-level pooled analysis from the GRAND-DES registry

Background: The contribution of sex and initial clinical presentation to the long-term outcomes in patients undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) is still debated. Methods: Individual patient data from 5 Korean-multicenter drug-eluting stent (DES) registries (The GRAND-DES) were pooled. A total of 17,286 patients completed 3-year follow-up (5216 women and 12,070 men). The median follow-up duration was 1125 days (interquartile range 1097–1140 days), and the primary endpoint was cardiac death at 3 years. Results: The clinical indication for PCI was stable angina pectoris (SAP) in 36.8%, unstable angina pectoris (UAP) or non-ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (NSTEMI) in 47.4%, and STEMI in 15.8%. In all groups, women were older and had a higher proportion of hypertension and diabetes mellitus compared with men. Women presenting with STEMI were older than women with SAP, with the opposite seen in men. There was no sex difference in cardiac death for SAP or UAP/NSTEMI. In STEMI patients, the incidence of cardiac death (7.9% vs. 4.4%, p = 0.001), all-cause mortality (11.1% vs. 6.9%, p = 0.001), and minor bleeding (2.2% vs. 1.2%, p = 0.043) was significantly higher in women. After multivariable adjustment, cardiac death was lower in women for UAP/NSTEMI (HR 0.69, 95% CI 0.53–0.89, p = 0.005), while it was similar for STEMI (HR 0.97, 95% CI 0.65–1.44, p = 0.884). Conclusions: There was no sex difference in cardiac death after PCI with DES for SAP and UAP/NSTEMI patients. In STEMI patients, women had worse outcomes compared with men; however, after the adjustment of confounders, female sex was not an independent predictor of mortality

Task-Oriented Parameter Tuning Based on Priority Condition for Biologically Inspired Robot Application

This work gives a biologically inspired control scheme for controlling a robotic system. Novel adaptive behaviors are observed from humans or animals even in unexpected disturbances or environment changes. This is why they have neural oscillator networks in the spinal cord to yield rhythmic-motor primitives robustly under a changing task. Hence, this work focuses on rhythmic arm movements that can be accomplished in terms of employing a control approach based on an artificial neural oscillator model. The main challenge is to determine various parameters for applying a neural feedback to robotic systems with performing a desired behavior and self-maintaining the entrainment effect. Hence, this work proposes a task-oriented parameter tuning algorithm based on the simulated annealing (SA). This work also illustrates how to technically implement the proposed control scheme exploiting a virtual force and neural feedback. With parameters tuned, it is verified in simulations that a 3-DOF planar robotic arm traces a given trajectory precisely, adapting to uneven external disturbances

Quietto: An Interactive Timepiece Molded in Concrete and Milled Wood

We introduce Quietto: an interactive timepiece made of molded concrete and milled wood. It shows upcoming daily schedules and the time through the quiet, ambient motions of a clock hand and light through the concrete touch interface. The results of an in-field user observation of 10 participants over 3 days showed the possibilities of using concrete as a unique and attractive material for designing a tangible interface due to its unexpected haptic feeling. We also found that Quietto provides an intuitive and effective representation of its users' daily schedules and can be used as a private, personal device. Through its distinctive design, Quietto can provide a new way of understanding scheduling through its concrete texture and amusing interaction qualities