General thoracic and cardiovascular surgery
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Gen Thorac Cardiovasc Surg · Dec 2007
Case ReportsThymoma with spontaneous regression and disappearance of pleural effusion.
A 31-year-old woman was admitted to our hospital with sudden onset of chest pain. Chest radiography and computed tomography (CT) on admission showed an anterior mediastinal tumor with left pleural effusion, which was diagnosed as an inoperable malignant mediastinal tumor. However, 3 weeks after admission CT showed that the tumor was diminishing and the pleural effusion had disappeared without any treatment. ⋯ It was then assumed to be a benign teratoma that had been ruptured into the thoracic cavity. The operation was converted to a thoracotomy to resect it, but it could not be completely resected because of inflammatory adhesions to the mediastinum. Two months later, total thymectomy was performed through a median sternotomy because the tumor was pathologically diagnosed as a thymoma.
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Gen Thorac Cardiovasc Surg · Dec 2007
An attempt to analyze the relation between hospital surgical volume and clinical outcome.
The aim of this study was to investigate the relation between hospital volume and clinical surgical outcome for 10 cardiac, lung, and esophageal surgical procedures. ⋯ An inverse correlation was noted between hospital volume and operative mortality in the present study, although wide variations in clinical outcome were noted among the very low-volume hospitals. Further analysis is warranted using risk-adjusted data.
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Gen Thorac Cardiovasc Surg · Dec 2007
Case ReportsRepair of traumatic tricuspid regurgitation by bicuspidization.
Traumatic tricuspid regurgitation is a fairly rare complication following blunt chest trauma but not as uncommon as it was believed to be before the advent of transthoracic echocardiography. We report a case of severe tricuspid regurgitation with ruptured chordae tendineae 10 years after blunt chest trauma that was successfully repaired with a simple method. The operative technique consisted of plication of the anteroposterior commissure to create a bicuspid valve, along with ring annuloplasty.