BioMed research international
-
Nausea and vomiting of pregnancy is the most common medical condition in pregnancy. There is an increasing trend to prescribe ondansetron although its safety for use in pregnancy has not been established. ⋯ Our study did not detect any adverse outcomes from the use of ondansetron in pregnancy but could not conclude that ondansetron is safe to use in pregnancy.
-
Clinical Trial
Rehabilitation of children with hemiparesis: a pilot study on the use of virtual reality.
A wide range of treatments have been used to improve upper arm motor performances in children with congenital hemiplegia. Recent findings are suggesting that virtual reality based intervention could be a promising tool also in pediatric rehabilitation. ⋯ Our findings seem to support the evidence that VR treatment could be a promising and engaging tool for pediatric rehabilitation. However, the limited size of the population and the small number of sessions require further investigations and RCTs to confirm our positive results.
-
Improvement in PFT after bronchodilators is characteristic of obstructive airway diseases such as COPD. However, improvement in patients with restrictive pattern is occasionally seen. We aim to determine the clinical significance of a bronchodilator responsive restrictive defect. ⋯ Reversible restrictive pattern on spirometry appears to be a variant of obstructive lung disease in which early airway closure results in air trapping and low FVC. In symptomatic patients, a therapeutic trial of bronchodilators may be beneficial.
-
Critically ill patients experience severe stress, inflammation and clinical conditions which may increase the utilization and metabolic turnover of vitamin B-6 and may further increase their oxidative stress and compromise their antioxidant capacity. This study was conducted to examine the relationship between vitamin B-6 status (plasma and erythrocyte PLP) oxidative stress, and antioxidant capacities in critically ill surgical patients. ⋯ Plasma PLP was positively associated with the mean SOD activity level on day 1 (r = 0.42, P < 0.05), day 7 (r = 0.37, P < 0.05), and on changes (Δ (day 7 - day 1)) (r = 0.56, P < 0.01) after adjusting for age, gender, and plasma C-reactive protein concentration. Higher plasma PLP could be an important contributing factor in the elevation of antioxidant enzyme activity in critically ill surgical patients.
-
Preparation of the motor system for movement execution involves an increase in excitability of motor pathways. In a reaction time task paradigm, a startling auditory stimulus (SAS) delivered together with the imperative signal (IS) shortens reaction time significantly. In self-generated tasks we considered that an appropriately timed SAS would have similar effects. ⋯ However, a cluster of action trials was observed within 200 ms after SAS. These trials showed larger EMG bursts, shorter movement time, shorter time to peak velocity, and higher peak velocity than other action trials (P < 0.001 for all), with no difference from Reaction trials containing SAS. The results show that SAS influences the execution of self-generated human actions as it does with preprogrammed reaction time tasks during the assumed building up of preparatory activity before execution of the willed motor action.