Revista médica de Chile
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Revista médica de Chile · Dec 2020
Case Reports[Inferior vena cava agenesis presenting as deep vein thrombosis. Report of one case].
Abnormalities of the inferior vena cava are rare. Its embryological development occurs between the sixth and eighth week of gestation and depends on the persistence or regression of three pairs of veins: the posterior cardinal veins, the subcardinal veins and the supracardinal veins. The type of congenital alteration depends on the moment that embryogenesis is altered. ⋯ An abdominal CAT scan showed an agenesis of the supra and infra-adrenal inferior vena cava, with multiple collaterals. The study for thrombophilia was negative. The patient was treated with vitamin K antagonists with a good clinical response.
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Hypopituitarism after moderate or severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) is usually underdiagnosed and therefore undertreated. Its course can be divided in an acute phase during the first 14 days after TBI with 50 to 80% risk of hypopituitarism, and a chronic phase, beginning three months after the event, with a prevalence of hypopituitarism that ranges from 2 to 70%. Its pathophysiology has been addressed in several studies, suggesting that a vascular injury to the pituitary tissue is the most important mechanism during the acute phase, and an autoimmune one during chronic stages. ⋯ Hence, we propose a simple and cost-effective algorithm to detect and treat a potential hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis impairment and alterations of sodium homeostasis, both of which can be life-threatening. In the chronic phase, post-concussion syndrome is the most important differential diagnosis. Given the high prevalence of hypopituitarism, we suggest that all pituitary axes should be assessed in all patients with moderate to severe TBI, between 3 to 6 months after the event, and then repeated at 12 months after trauma by a specialized team in pituitary disease.
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Revista médica de Chile · Dec 2020
[Implementation of an Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) for Anesthesiology Certification in Chile].
Anesthesiology became the first Chilean medical specialty certification board to incorporate an objective structured clinical examination (OSCE) into its certification system. The main reason for the introduction of an OSCE is to include an evaluation that allow candidates to demonstrate what they really "do" in clinical practice domains. Inherent in this justification is that the OSCE detects competences that are not well evaluated in current written and oral exams. This article describes the process of implementing an OSCE in Anesthesiology certification and a description of its application after one year of operation.
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Revista médica de Chile · Dec 2020
[Survival analysis of patients starting hemodialysis in Chile between 2013 and 2019].
Renal replacement therapies, especially hemodialysis (HD) in end-stage kidney disease, avoid an inevitable death caused by the disease. However, in elderly patients with multiple comorbidities, this therapy could derive in a comparable survival than conservative management. Considering that HD represents a high cost for the health system, it is worth analyzing the effects of HD on survival. ⋯ The median survival of patients on HD is dependent on age and the presence of comorbidities, among other factors. We performed an analysis to determine if starting HD in older patients with comorbidities has a real benefit over conservative management in terms of survival.