Ruptured abdominal infrarenal aortic aneurysms - surgical treatment and outcome

Emergency Institute Of Cardiovascular Diseases ”Prof.Dr.C.C. Iliescu” Vascular Surgery Department, Bucharest, Romania, Al XI-lea Congres al Asociației Chirurgilor „Nicolae Anestiadi” din Republica Moldova și cea de-a XXXIII-a Reuniune a Chirurgilor din Moldova „Iacomi-Răzeșu” 27-30 septembrie 2011Repair of ruptured abdominal aortic aneurysm carries a considerable rate of morbidity and mortality. Management of ruptured abdominal aortic aneurysms demands immediate diagnosis and a trained team to assess and deliver operative care, as well as logistic support in a dedicated center. Materials and method: Our experience consists of 63 cases of ruptured abdominal aortic aneurysm repair (2004- June 2011) - 57 males (90,5%) and 6 females (9,5%). There were 61 infrarenal abdominal aortic aneurysms (96,8%) and 2 thoracoabdominal aneurysms (3,2%). 35 patients were admitted in hemorrhagic shock (55,5%) and 38 were hemodynamically stable (45,5%). Results: We encountered 7 intraoperative deaths (11,1%), 19 postoperative deaths (30,1%) and 37 patients with long term survival (58,7%).Conclusions: Ruptured abdominal aortic aneurysm is a life-threatening condition that requires emergent surgery, followed by significant perioperative mortality and morbidity

Optical Properties of Borate Glass-Ceramics

Optical properties of bismuth borate are measured for the composition range x Bi2O3 (1-x) B2O3, 0.25 < x < 0.65. The refractive indices increase as the bismuth content is increasing. Also the ultraviolet absorption edge was shown to shift to longer wavelengths. From these measurements a generalized Sellmeier formula was derived. Applying heat treatments to the prepared bismuth borate glasses in order to obtain glass ceramics leads in most cases to surface nucleation. It was proved that dopants increase the number of nucleating sites on the surfaces. On erbium-doped samples absorption and luminescence measurements were made. The Judd-Ofelt analysis revealed comparably high Judd-Ofelt coefficients. All coefficients were shown to decrease as the Bi2O3 content increases. The luminescence at 1550 nm reveals a broad and flat band which is narrowing with the increase in Bi2O3 content. The green upconversion was observed and the temporal behavior of the emission at 550 nm was investigated. The absorption and emission spectra of chromium-doped bismuth borate glasses were measured. On surface crystallized glasses, for x = 0.5 Bi2O3 and high chromium content, luminescence of chromate (CrO2-4) ion doped BiBO3 microcrystals was observed. Strontium barium niobate microcrystals embedded in strontium barium borate matrix were obtained by spontaneous nucleation in the melt and rapid quenching. Optical properties of Pb2B5O9Br based glass were also investigated. The heat treatment applied leads to the formation of small nanocrystals inside the glass

Carotid endarterectomy in treatment of critical symptomatic and asymptomatic carotidian stenosis

Emergency Institute Of Cardiovascular Diseases ”Prof. Dr. C.C. Iliescu” Vascular Surgery Department, Bucharest, Romania, Al XI-lea Congres al Asociației Chirurgilor „Nicolae Anestiadi” din Republica Moldova și cea de-a XXXIII-a Reuniune a Chirurgilor din Moldova „Iacomi-Răzeșu” 27-30 septembrie 2011This presentation’s objective is to identify efficacy of the surgical treatment of critical carotid stenosis using direct endarterectomy, in our experience. It’s been over 50 years since the first CEA and 15 years since the publication of the Nord-American and European trials’ results- which stated surgery as the elective procedure of treatment for the extracranial cerebrovascular occlusive disease.Material and Method: Our experience consists of 411 cases of carotid endarterectomies (1997- June 2011). There were 139 asymptomatic patients and 272 symptomatic patients, 173 with minor stroke, 99 with TIA. 380 carotid endarterectomies were performed, followed by venous patch angioplasty in 332 cases, Dacron patch angioplasty in 39 cases and PTFE patch in 8 cases. There were 31 cases of primary closure of the arteriotomy, and 5 patients with bilateral simultaneous carotid endarterectomy. Results: 2 patients suffered postoperative major stroke (one ischemic, one hemorrhagic) and 4 deaths (2- AMI and 2- major stroke). Mortality and combined mortality/perioperative stroke rate was of 1,21 % (only in symptomatic patients). Conculsions: In our experience, carotid endarterectomy remains the method of choice in critical carotid stenosis treatment

Extensive identification of genes involved in congenital and structural heart disorders and cardiomyopathy

Clinical presentation of congenital heart disease is heterogeneous, making identification of the disease-causing genes and their genetic pathways and mechanisms of action challenging. By using in vivo electrocardiography, transthoracic echocardiography and microcomputed tomography imaging to screen 3,894 single-gene-null mouse lines for structural and functional cardiac abnormalities, here we identify 705 lines with cardiac arrhythmia, myocardial hypertrophy and/or ventricular dilation. Among these 705 genes, 486 have not been previously associated with cardiac dysfunction in humans, and some of them represent variants of unknown relevance (VUR). Mice with mutations in Casz1, Dnajc18, Pde4dip, Rnf38 or Tmem161b genes show developmental cardiac structural abnormalities, with their human orthologs being categorized as VUR. Using UK Biobank data, we validate the importance of the DNAJC18 gene for cardiac homeostasis by showing that its loss of function is associated with altered left ventricular systolic function. Our results identify hundreds of previously unappreciated genes with potential function in congenital heart disease and suggest causal function of five VUR in congenital heart disease