Complete removal of heart-compressing large mediastinal lipoma : a case report

An 83-year-old man presented with worsening of respiratory discomfort and underwent close examination, which revealed a large mediastinal lipoma measuring 15 × 10 cm. The patient showed heart failure symptoms due to heart compression by tumor. The tumor was completely removed safely and reliably by cutting the ascending aorta, main pulmonary artery and superior vena cava. Although preoperative examination could not determine whether the tumor was lipoma or liposarcoma, we selected an invasive surgical therapy because neither radiation therapy nor chemotherapy was considered effective for either type of tumor. We report here a very rare case of heart-compressing mediastinal tumor

Surgical Results in T2N0M0 Nonsmall Cell Lung Cancer Patients With Large Tumors 5 cm or Greater in Diameter: What Regulates Outcome?

金沢大学医学部附属病院呼吸器外科Background: We assessed the surgical results along with the clinical and biological features of nonsmall-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients with localized large tumors. Methods: The study population consisted of 86 NSCLC patients who underwent complete resection of tumors 5 cm or larger in diameter in stage IB (T2N0M0). We immunohistochemically assessed the expression of angiostatin and endostatin. Results: The median tumor size was 6.0 cm (range, 5 to 14 cm). The operative procedures used were lobectomy in 71 cases, bilobectomy in 8 cases, and pneumonectomy in 11 cases. Fifty patients (58.1%) relapsed during the mean follow-up period of 33.6 ± 4.5 months. The median disease-free interval was 9 months. Of 44 recurrent patients whose disease-free interval could be identified, 25 patients (56.8%) relapsed within 12 months after the operation. The overall 5- and 10-year survival rates were 42.0% and 24.2%, respectively. Multivariate analysis showed that the degree of pleural involvement and angiostatin expression within the tumor were independent prognostic indicators. The endostatin expression within tumors also had a weaker relationship with outcome. Conclusions: Long-term surgical results were poor and early relapse was common in this cohort. In addition to pleural involvement, the tumor-induced expression of angiostatin and endostatin merit further investigation to gain possible insights into selection of patients who will benefit from surgery as the first line treatment. © 2006 The Society of Thoracic Surgeons

Glucocorticoid-dependent Tubulointerstitial Nephritis with IgM-positive Plasma Cells Presenting with Intracellular Crystalline Inclusions within the Rough Endoplasmic Reticulum

Tubulointerstitial nephritis (TIN) with IgM-positive plasma cells (IgMPC-TIN) is an autoimmune kidney disease characterized by IgM/CD138-double-positive plasma cell infiltration in the tubulointerstitium. A 50-year-old man developed IgMPC-TIN and presented with crystalline inclusions in the rough endoplasmic reticulum. Intracellular crystal formation is a rare finding in paraprotein-related kidney diseases, but this case showed no pathogenic monoclonal immunoglobulin. Prednisolone (PSL, 30 mg) improved the TIN, but PSL tapering resulted in the recurrence of TIN. Combination therapy with 15 mg PSL and 150 mg mizoribine ultimately stabilized TIN. This case offers original evidence concerning the pathophysiology and treatment strategy of IgMPC-TIN

Modelling time-lapse shear-wave velocity changes in an unsaturated soil embankment due to water infiltration and drainage

Applied Geophysics and Petrophysic

Enumeration of region partitioning for evacuation planning based on ZDD

ISORA 2013 : The 11th International Symposium on Operations Research and its Applications in engineering , Aug 23-25, 2013 , Yellow Mountain, ChinaJapanese cities always have risks of large-scale earthquakes. Thus, it is very important to establish crisis management systems against large-scale disasters such as big earthquakes, and tsunamis to secure evacuation centers for evacuees. In this respect, it is extremely important to provide sufficient evacuation centers and to appropriately partition the whole region into small areas, such that a unique evacuation center is located in each area and the people living in the area can easily evacuate to the center. However, it is hard to find an optimal region partitioning, due to the uncertainty, such as a fire or collapsed buildings. In this research, we propose a method to enumerate all partitioning patterns using Zero-suppressed Binary Decision Diagram (ZDD) that satisfy several conditions. We apply the proposed method to Kamigyo Ward of Kyoto City, Japan