Journal of Korean medical science
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J. Korean Med. Sci. · Sep 2012
Multicenter Study Clinical TrialAntihypertensive treatment of acute intracerebral hemorrhage by intravenous nicardipine hydrochloride: prospective multi-center study.
The authors performed a multicenter prospective study to evaluate the feasibility and safety of intravenous nicardipine hydrochloride for acute hypertension in patients with intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH). This study included 88 patients (mean age: 58.3 yr, range 26-87 yr) with ICH and acute hypertension in 5 medical centers between August 2008 and November 2010, who were treated using intravenous nicardipine. ⋯ Neurological deterioration (defined as a decrease in initial Glasgow coma scale ≥ 2) was observed in 2 (2.2%) of 88 patients during the treatment. Aggressive nicardipine treatment of acute hypertension in patients with ICH can be safe and effective with a low rate of neurological deterioration and hematoma expansion.
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J. Korean Med. Sci. · Sep 2012
Case ReportsEffectiveness of [(124)I]-PET/CT and [(18)F]-FDG-PET/CT for localizing recurrence in patients with differentiated thyroid carcinoma.
Although the prognosis of patients with differentiated thyroid carcinoma (DTC) is generally encouraging, a diagnostic dilemma is posed when an increasing level of serum thyroglobulin (Tg) is noted, without detection of a recurrent tumor using conventional imaging tools such as the iodine-131 whole-body scanning (the [(131)I] scan) or neck ultrasonography (US). The objective of the present study was to evaluate the diagnostic value of [(124)I]-PET/CT and [(18)F]-FDG-PET/CT in terms of accurate detection of both iodine- and non-iodine-avid recurrence, compared with that of conventional imaging such as the [(131)I] scan or neck ultrasonography (US). Between July 2009 and June 2010, we prospectively studied 19 DTC patients with elevated thyroglobulin levels but who do not show pathological lesions when conventional imaging modalities are used. ⋯ Among such patients, disease management was modified in six (66.7%) and disease was restaged in seven (77.8%). In particular, the use of the described imaging combination optimized planning of surgical resection to deal with locoregional recurrence in 21.1% (4/19) of patients, who were shown to be disease-free during follow-up after surgery. Our results indicate that combination of [(18)F]-FDG-PET/CT and [(124)I]-PET/CT affords a valuable diagnostic method that can be used to make therapeutic decisions in patients with DTC who are tumor-free on conventional imaging studies but who have high Tg levels.
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J. Korean Med. Sci. · Sep 2012
Salivary bisphenol-A levels due to dental sealant/resin: a case-control study in Korean children.
Dental sealants and composite filling materials containing bisphenol-A (BPA) derivatives are increasingly used in children. The aim of this study was to evaluate the association between salivary BPA and the number of tooth surfaces filled with dental sealant, and to determine a cutoff BPA level. Salivary BPA concentration and the number of tooth surfaces filled with dental sealant/resin were determined in 124 age and gender matched children: 62 controls had no dental sealant/resin on their tooth surfaces and 62 cases had more than 4 tooth surfaces with dental sealant/resin. ⋯ The BPA level of control (0.40 µg/L) was significantly lower than that of case (0.92 µg/L) after controlling for confounders (P = 0.026). Although the 90th BPA percentile had an adjusted OR of 4.58 (95% CI 1.04-20.26, P = 0.045), the significance disappeared in the conditional logistic model. There may be a relationship between salivary BPA level and dental sealant/resin.
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J. Korean Med. Sci. · Sep 2012
Elevated insulin and insulin resistance are associated with the advanced pathological stage of prostate cancer in Korean population.
The study was designed to investigate the effect of serum glucose, insulin and insulin resistance on the risk of prostate cancer (CaP) and on the clinicopathological characteristics in Korean men. Subjects were retrospectively recruited from 166 CaP patients underwent radical prostatectomy and 166 age-matched benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) patients. The serum was taken on the morning of the day of operation and insulin resistance was assessed by homeostasis model assessment insulin resistance index (HOMA-IR). ⋯ The patients in highest tertile of insulin had a more than 5.6 fold risk of locally advanced stage than those in the lowest tertile (OR = 5.62, 95% CI = 1.88-16.83, P = 0.002). Moreover, the patients in the highest tertile HOMA-IR group was associated with an increased risk of locally advanced stage than the lowest tertile group (OR = 3.10, 95% CI = 1.07-8.99, P = 0.037). These results suggest that elevated insulin and insulin resistance are associated with the advanced pathological stage of prostate cancer in Korean patients.
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J. Korean Med. Sci. · Sep 2012
Assessing the quality of randomized controlled trials published in the Journal of Korean Medical Science from 1986 to 2011.
Low quality clinical trials have a possibility to have errors in the process of deriving the results and therefore distort the study. Quality assessment of clinical trial is necessary in order to prevent any clinical application erroneous results is important. Randomized controlled trial (RCT) is a design for evaluate the effectiveness of medical procedure. ⋯ To compare the quality of articles of JKMS, quality analysis of the RCTs published in Yonsei Medical Journal (YMJ) and Korean Journal of Internal Medicine was also conducted. In the JKMS, YMJ and Korean Journal of Internal Medicine, the quantitative increase of RCT presented over time was observed but no qualitative improvement of RCT was observed over time. From the results of this study, it is required for the researchers to plan for and perform higher quality studies.