Consequences of Vasectomy: experience of men who underwent the surgery in Campinas (Sao Paulo), Brazil

Objective: To describe the experience of men who had a vasectomy at least one year before at public healthcare services at Campinas, State of Sao Paulo. Methodological procedures: descriptive study with a qualitative and a quantitative component. In the qualitative stage, 10 semi-structured interviews were performed with men selected according to purposeful criteria of level of schooling and number of children. Then, a structured form was provided for 202 men, drawn from the complete list of those who had had a vasectomy between 1998 and 2004. A thematic analysis of the content of the semi-structured interviews was carried out. The quantitative data were keyboarded and a descriptive analysis was conducted. Results: It was observed that 97% of the men were satisfied because they had undergone the surgery and only a few of them mentioned undesired effects. Among the few dissatisfied men, only one had had vasectomy reversal because he lived with a new partner and wanted to have children; among the others, dissatisfaction was due to the pain caused by the surgical procedure. The majority of the interviewees attributed to vasectomy changes for the best in their health, body, general relationship with their families and wives, in their sexual life and economic situation. The idea that prevailed was that vasectomy had brought only benefits. The possibility of regret was mentioned by the interviewees as something that would not happen to them. Conclusion: The results of this study allowed to verify that men who decide to have a vasectomy tend to see the method as a factor of positive changes, mainly in the sexual life and in the relationship with the partner and family in general.20356857

Can portable tomosynthesis improve the diagnostic value of bedside chest X-ray in the intensive care unit? A proof of concept study

Abstract: Portable bedside chest X-ray (CXR) is an important and frequently used tool in the intensive care unit (ICU). Unfortunately, the diagnostic value of portable CXR is often low due to technical limitations and suboptimal patient positioning. Additionally, abnormalities in the chest may be hidden on the projection image by overlapping anatomy and devices such as endotracheal tubes, lines and catheters. Digital tomosynthesis (DTS) can solve the problem of anatomical overlap. In DTS, several low-dose X-ray images from different angles are acquired and subsequently used by a reconstruction algorithm to compute section images along planes parallel to the detector. However, a portable device to be used for portable bedside chest DTS is not on the market yet. In this work, we discuss modifications to a portable X-ray device to enable portable DTS and illustrate the potential of portable DTS to improve the diagnostic value of bedside CXR in the ICU. A simulation, based on computed tomography scans, is presented. Our experiments comparing portable DTS with conventional bedside CXR showed a substantially improved detection of pneumothorax and other abnormalities