The Journal of thoracic and cardiovascular surgery
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J. Thorac. Cardiovasc. Surg. · Dec 2011
Bone marrow-derived MCP1 required for experimental aortic aneurysm formation and smooth muscle phenotypic modulation.
This study tested the hypothesis that monocyte chemotactic protein 1 (MCP1) is required for abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) and smooth muscle phenotypic modulation in a mouse elastase perfusion model. ⋯ These results have shown that MCP1 derived from bone marrow cells is required for experimental AAA formation and that retention of nonbone marrow MCP1 limits AAA compared with global depletion. This protein contributes to macrophage infiltration into the AAA and can act directly on SMCs to reduce contractile proteins and induce MMPs.
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J. Thorac. Cardiovasc. Surg. · Dec 2011
Inefficiency as the major driver of excess costs in lung resection.
Risk-adjusted outcomes of surgical care are important for quality and cost assessments. Although cardiac surgery is commonly studied, risk-adjusted analysis of excess costs of lung resection has not been pursued. ⋯ Inefficiency is the major factor in excess inpatient costs associated with lung resection in this model. Although refinements in databases, including total physician costs and postdischarge adverse event costs, will alter models, excess costs of lung resection appear to be driven by inefficiency, not adverse outcomes.
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J. Thorac. Cardiovasc. Surg. · Dec 2011
A fetal goat model of cardiopulmonary bypass with cardioplegic arrest and hemodynamic assessment.
Increasing evidence shows that some cardiac defects may benefit from fetal interventions, including fetal cardiac surgery. We attempted to develop an in vivo animal model of fetal cardiopulmonary bypass with cardioplegic arrest. ⋯ We confirmed the technical feasibility of establishing an in vivo model of fetal cardiac bypass with cardioplegic arrest. This fetal goat model provides reproducible data and is suitable to study clinically relevant problems related to fetal cardiopulmonary bypass, myocardial protection, and hemodynamics.