Seminars in thoracic and cardiovascular surgery
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Semin. Thorac. Cardiovasc. Surg. · Jan 2012
Mechanical support for pulmonary veno-occlusive disease: combined atrial septostomy and venovenous extracorporeal membrane oxygenation.
The use of atrial septostomy for refractory pulmonary hypertension and right ventricular failure results in an adequate left ventricular preload and improved cardiac output at the expense of a profound hypoxic shunt. Combined dual-lumen venovenous extracorporeal membrane oxygenation and atrial septostomy provides extracorporeal gas exchange of venous return before the directional right atrial to left atrial shunt, can be deployed percutaneously, and results in an ambulatory patient with stable hemodynamics.
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Semin. Thorac. Cardiovasc. Surg. · Jan 2012
Extrapleural catheters: an effective alternative for treating postoperative pain for thoracic surgical patients.
Pain control is an important aspect of video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) procedures. Offering an effective and low-risk method of postoperative pain control is thus vital to a patient's recovery. Hotta and colleagues report the results of a clinical study comparing efficacy of epidurals vs extrapleural catheters in VATS procedures. They found that extrapleural catheters provided equivalent postoperative pain relief when compared to thoracic epidural catheters.
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Semin. Thorac. Cardiovasc. Surg. · Jan 2012
The future of tissue-engineered organs for transplant? It's here!
The first-in-man bioengineered artificial tracheobronchial transplant consisting of a synthetic scaffold and autologous bone marrow-derived mesenchymal cells was recently reported. Extensive evaluation of the patient before and after transplant provides some insight into the potential mechanisms of stem cell mobilization and tracheal tissue regeneration.