São Paulo medical journal = Revista paulista de medicina
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Liver damage is relatively common in patients affected by Hodgkin's disease. A smaller proportion of cases develops jaundice. Recently, the vanishing bile duct syndrome was described in Hodgkin's disease. The mechanisms of this severe complication have been poorly understood until now. ⋯ A 38-year-old male patient affected by Hodgkin's disease. Liver biopsy showed no detectable Hodgkin's disease. Intra-hepatic cholestasis was found and none of the six portal tracts analyzed contained normal bile ducts. The treatment was based on conventional and high-dose escalation chemotherapy. The patient died from an irreversible liver failure while in complete remission from Hodgkin's disease.
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Many factors like exposure to UV radiation, climatic conditions, genetic predisposition, immunological state and, more recently, the presence of HPV have been implicated in the genesis of some lesions of the conjunctiva, especially the carcinoma. ⋯ The low frequency of HPV DNA found in the lesions of this sample and the detection of the viral genome in the normal mucosa indicate that there is a weak possibility of association between HPV infection and the carcinoma of the conjunctiva.
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The incidence of staphylococcal infection has been increasing during the last 20 years. ⋯ A 45-year-old-man, without addictions and without known previous cardiopathy, was diagnosed as having definitive acute bacterial endocarditis due to Staphylococcus aureus. Its etiology was community-acquired, arising from a non-apparent primary focus. In addition, the musculoskeletal symptoms preceded the infective endocarditis (IE) by about 1 month, which occurred together with other symptoms, e.g. mycotic aneurysms and petechiae. Later, the patient showed perforation of the mitral valve and moderate mitral insufficiency with clinical control.
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Cancer patients are at unusually high risk for developing bloodstream infections (BSI), which are a major cause of in-hospital morbidity and mortality. ⋯ The identification of the microbiology profile of BSI and the recognition of possible risk factors in high-risk cancer patients may help in planning and conducting more effective infection control and preventive measures, and may also allow further analytical studies for reducing severe infectious complications in such groups of patients.