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Nine patients with severe coronary artery disease and disabling angina receiving either regular metoprolol or oxprenolol, together with glyceryl trinitrate tablets as required for chest pain, were studied. Nifedipine 10 mg three times per day was compared to placebo in a double blind randomized control trial, using patient diary cards and exercise tests. The number of recorded episodes of angina during the placebo period of 15.0 +/- 2.1 (mean +/- s.e.m.) per patient per week was significantly reduced to 11.2 +/- 2.5 during the nifedipine period (P less than 0.05). Similarly, the recorded number of glyceryl trinitrate tablets consumed during the placebo period of 12.6 +/- 2.1 was significantly reduced to 9.1 +/- 2.0 tablets per patient per week during the nifedipine period (P less than 0.05). There was a statistically significant increase in both the duration of exercise to onset of chest pain (from 241 +/- 16.3 seconds on placebo to 306 +/- 38.4 seconds on nifedipine (P less than 0.05)) and the total work performed to the onset of chest pain during the nifedipine period compared to the control and placebo periods (P less than 0.05). There was a significant increase (P less than 0.05) in exercise time before the onset of appreciable ST depression (greater than 1 mm) on exercise testing during the nifedipine period (66.2 +/- 4.2 sec) compared to the control period (51.2 +/- 3.0 sec) and placebo periods (58.7 +/- 3.5 sec). Although nifedipine was generally well tolerated, one patient experienced a severe episode of angina whilst taking the drug, which required admission to hospital. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Forty consecutive patients with coronary artery disease undergoing left ventricular angiography took part in a randomised double blind trial comparing a conventional contrast medium sodium meglumine iothalamate (Cardio-Conray) with the low osmolar agent iopamidol. Iopamidol produced a smaller rise in heart rate and a smaller fall in left ventricular systolic pressure, but the changes in left ventricular and diastolic pressure and maximum rate of change of pressure (dP/dt max) were not different. The numbers of extrasystoles per minute for five minutes after ventriculography were similar in both groups except for the first 15 seconds, when the number of extrasystoles was increased in the iopamidol group. The frequency and magnitude of symptoms (heat, angina, headache, nausea) were significantly different in two groups. Iopamidol caused less haemodynamic disturbance than Cardio-Conray, although the improvement is small and offers no advantage in reducing symptoms or extrasystoles. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Biopsy studies of the jejunal mucosa in patients with idiopathic steatorrhoea after periods on a gluten-free diet showed that the epithelium improved quickly in respect of surface cell height, mucosal thickness, and mitosis count, and more slowly in respect of villous height and width. In no case was recovery complete in every particular. Appearances seen through the dissecting microscope improved slowly and incompletely. Gluten loading after a period on a gluten-free diet partially reversed some of these mucosal changes in as short a time as five to seven days. Measuring such changes may help to hasten the diagnosis in some patients with suspected gluten-sensitive enteropathy in whom there is otherwise difficulty in assessing the clinical response to a gluten-free diet. The histological response of the jejunum to a gluten-free diet and to subsequent gluten loading may help to clarify the aetiological relationship between carcinoma and jejunal mucosal atrophy. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Since non-specific chest pain, which is a common feature after myocardial infarction, may be due to a mild form of Dressler's (postmyocardial infarction) syndrome 80 patients were studied after confirmed myocardial infarction. Two patients had clinical features of classical Dressler's syndrome with high erythrocyte sedimentation rates and strongly positive results for antimyocardial antibodies. Twenty three patients had non-specific chest pain; none had clinical features of Dressler's syndrome. There was no difference in the erythrocyte sedimentation rate between this group and the remainder who had no pain. Equal numbers in each group had weakly positive test results for antimyocardial antibodies; none had a strongly positive result. Thus there appears to be no evidence for a mild form of Dressler's syndrome, and the erythrocyte sedimentation rate and weakly positive results for antimyocardial antibodies are of no diagnostic value in Dressler's syndrome. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

We present a flora and fauna dataset for the Mira-Mataje binational basins. This is an area shared between southwestern Colombia and northwestern Ecuador, where both the Chocó and Tropical Andes biodiversity hotspots converge. We systematized data from 120 sources in the Darwin Core Archive (DwC-A) standard and geospatial vector data format for geographic information systems (GIS) (shapefiles). Sources included natural history museums, published literature, and citizen science repositories across 13 countries. The resulting database has 33,460 records from 6,821 species, of which 540 have been recorded as endemic, and 612 as threatened. The diversity represented in the dataset is equivalent to 10% of the total plant species and 26% of the total terrestrial vertebrate species in both hotspots. The dataset can be used to estimate and compare biodiversity patterns with environmental parameters and provide value to ecosystems, ecoregions, and protected areas. The dataset is a baseline for future assessments of biodiversity in the face of environmental degradation, climate change, and accelerated extinction processes., (© 2024. The Author(s).)