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Gastroesophageal reflux disease(GERD) is believed to be common and chronic gastrointestinal disorder. Quantitative estimates of the actual prevalence of GERD are difficult to obtain, because those who seek health care probably represent only a tip of the iceberg of people with GERD. The prevalence of heartburn and/or regurgitation, considered to be reasonably specific symptoms for the diagnosis of GERD, ranged from 10% to 48% for heartburn, from 9% to 45% for regurgitation and 21% to 59% for both/either in systematic review of GERD and reflux esophagitis(RE). It is widely accepted that the prevalence is lower in Asian countries, including Japan, compared with that in Western countries. However, the prevalence of RE in Japan may be increasing. In the case of heartburn and regurgitation in GERD and endoscopic findings in RE, different understandings of these terms by different investigators and subjects may have contributed to the range of results. Symptom definitions and what is understood by them should be among the most important considerations when undertaking population prevalence studies on reflux like symptoms, to allow comparisons to be made between studies.

The present study described 2 cases of patients with duodenal tuberculosis. Case 1 was a 55 year-old Japanese male patient with pulmonary tuberculosis and past medical history of subtotal gastrectomy (Billroth II reconstruction). Tubercle bacilli were positive both on smear and culture from his sputum and feces. Because of complaining right hypochondralgia, upper gastrointestinal endoscopy was performed and revealed multiple ringed ulcers in the afferent limb of duodenum. Histopathological study of biopsy specimen demonstrated granulomatous inflammation as well as acid-fast bacilli confirmed by Ziehl-Neelsen staining. Tissue culture was positive for M. tuberculosis. Colonic tuberculosis was demonstrated by barium enema. Case 2 was a 45 year-old male patient with pulmonary tuberculosis in association with severe uncontrolled diabetes mellitus. Sputum polymerase chain reaction test was positive for M. tuberculosis. Granulomatous inflammation and positive acid-fast bacilli in biopsy specimen obtained from ulcers in the descending portion of the duodenum made a diagnosis of duodenal tuberculosis. No other intestinal tuberculous lesion was recognized. Since 1988, 11 cases of duodenal tuberculosis including the presented two cases have been reported in Japan. Most of the recent cases had tuberculous lesions in the descending portion of the duodenum and were diagnosed as duodenal tuberculosis by endoscopic examinations, while the majority of the cases reported before 1987 had tuberculosis in the more distant portions of the duodenum and were diagnosed mainly by surgical procedures.

Successful repair of a 8-month-old girl with polysplenia was reported. The cardiovascular anomalies were TAPVC (II b), incomplete ECD, interruption of inferior vena cava with hemiazygos continuation, bilateral superior vena cava, and left superior vena cava draining into the coronary sinus. Cardiopulmonary bypass was established with ascending aortic perfusion and caval cannulation. A left superior vena cava was directly cannulated after establishing partial bypass. In this case the left pulmonary vein drained into the right atrium near the orifice of the coronary sinus, so the atrial septal flap was made and sutured between the orifice of the left pulmonary vein and the coronary sinus in order to avoid late pulmonary vein obstruction. Then, atrium was separated by an intraatrial baffle which was sutured to the atrial septal flap. Recently, it becomes possible to surgical repair of polysplenia syndrome according to the advancements of the diagnostic methods, cardiopulmonary bypass, and the technique of the open heart surgery.

One hundred and fourty four patients with non-ulcer dyspepsia (NUD), as defined by the working party of AGA in 1987, (67 men and 77 women, 16-76 years, mean age 42.9 +/- 1.2 years) and 34 asymptomatic controls (25 men and 9 women, 17-75 years, mean age 50.6 +/- 2.4 years) parameters of gastrophysiological function (gastric acid secretion, postprandial gastric emptying-acetaminophen method, serum gastrin levels and cutaneous electrogastrography (EGG)) and the prevalence of Helicobacter pylori (Hp) (histological and urease test of biopsy specimens) were investigated. Based on symptom patterns, there were 68 patients with dysmotility-like dyspepsia, 27 with ulcer-like dyspepsia, 17 with reflux-like dyspepsia, 6 with aerophagia and the 26 with nonspecific or idiopathic dyspepsia. The age distribution of NUD was predominant in the fourth decade, and the sex distribution was not significantly different. In general, hypersecretion of gastric acid and hypergastrinemia were rare in NUD patients. There was no significant difference in gastric acid secretion, basal and food stimulated serum gastrin levels and prevalence of Hp between the two groups. But 51 of 144 NUD patients (41.1%) had delayed gastric emptying (p < 0.05) compared to controls. Indeed gastric emptying was markedly prolonged in patients with dysmotility-like (58.1%) and reflux-like (42.9%) dyspepsia. On EGG, about a half of NUD patients showed evidence of bradygastria or tachygastria, in particular in the postprandial state, which was related to delayed gastric emptying. By chronic administration of cisapride, score of symptoms was significantly decreased and postprandial gastric emptying was significantly accelerated in delayed gastric emptying cases. We conclude that in NUD patients, in particular those with dysmotility-like dyspepsia, tests of postprandial gastric emptying and/or EGG are useful for investigation of gastric motor disorder and therapeutic effects of several prokinetic drugs clinically.

Repair of coarctation of the aorta was performed in 37 cases (31 patients, 6 patients of reoperation) ranging from 4 days old to 15 years old. Subclavian flap repair were performed in 15, resection and end-to-end anastomosis in 14, patch aortoplasty in 6, and interposition graft in 2. Subclavian flap angioplasty or end-to-end anastomosis is considered the procedure of choice in infants. However, the incidence of reoperation significantly increased in patients younger than age one month at initial subclavian flap repair. Mechanism of recurrent coarctation may be possibly related to retention of abnormal tissue, which is possibly ductal and/or intimal shelf, with the potential for proliferation and luminal narrowing. We suggest that in applicable case end-to-end anastomosis rather than subclavian flap angioplasty may be the surgical technique of choice in infants less than one month of age, and the most common reoperation technique was patch aortoplasty in re-stenosed cases.

A 9-month-old boy after the coarctectomy at 5 months old was successfully repaired by Senning procedure with closure of ventricular septal defect and resection of the membranous septal aneurysm causing the outflow tract stenosis of the left ventricle. Retrospectively, this case might have been possible to do Jatene procedure, however, attempts to resect the left ventricular outflow tract stenosis often failed to relieve stenosis completely. Therefore, the intraatrial switch operation seems to be better than the arterial switch operation when there is a possibility to remain left ventricular outflow tract stenosis. True estimation for these cases must await more case studies.

Recently there has been considerable experiments on biological and clinical application of ultrasound. However, the effect of ultrasound on cardiac function has not been fully understood. We have already reported the effect of the ultrasound myocardial stimulation (U.M.S.) in isolated rat heart. This study was undertaken to examine the potentiality of U.M.S. in clinical application. Twenty four mongrel dogs were divided into four groups, group I: ultrasound was irradiated in front half of the reperfusion time, group II: it was irradiated in last half of the reperfusion time group III: it was irradiated fully during the reperfusion time, group IV: it was not irradiated. The stimulator has the intensity of 1.5 W/cm2 in group I, II 0.1 W/cm2 in group III at the frequency of 1.23 MHz continuous wave, during early systolic phase (200 msec.) for twenty minutes. The right heart bypass model was used in the constant mean aortic pressure (75 mmHg) and rate (120 beats/min). The change in left ventricular function was defined as percent of control in the center of mass of Sarnoff curve. The change in end-diastolic, end-systolic segmental length and % shortening were measured. The result of left ventricular function recovery rate were follows, 74.9 +/- 9.13% in group I, 61.0 +/- 8.95% in group II, 78.7 +/- 14.1% in group III, 58.4 +/- 13.5% in group IV in measurement 1 (twenty minutes after reperfusion), and 77.6 +/- 9.45% in group I, 86.7 +/- 8.85% in group II, 86.8 +/- 16.3% in group III, 64.8 +/- 10.6% in group IV in measurement 2 (fifty minutes after reperfusion), indicating that U.M.S. had a significantly better recovery rates. As for end-diastolic, end-systolic segmental length and % shortening, the group that ultrasound was irradiated had a significantly better recovery in both measurement 1 and 2. CPK flow levels per minutes at 15, 35 minutes after reperfusion were significantly lower in the group receiving U.M.S. (p less than 0.05). Lactate extraction were higher in the group receiving U.M.S. at 35 and 45 minutes after reperfusion (p less than 0.05). Redox potential at 45 minutes after reperfusion were also found to be significantly higher in the group receiving U.M.S. (p less than 0.01). In conclusion, 1) U.M.S. possesses positive inotropic action. 2) U.M.S. also effective in preventing the occurrence of myocardial damage. 3) Myocardial metabolism was more aerobic in the group receiving U.M.S. particularly in group III (0.1 W/cm2). 4) These data indicated that U.M.S. has the potentiality in clinical application.