Der Internist
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The term sepsis was redefined in 2016 as a life-threatening organ dysfunction caused by an inadequate host response to an infection. The German S3 guidelines for the treatment of sepsis were published in 2018. ⋯ Despite an improved understanding of the pathophysiology, there is still no effective causal sepsis treatment, i.e. directed against the pathological host reaction. The treatment of patients with sepsis is therefore still based on the basic principles of correction of volume deficits, anti-infective agents, source control and organ support, including the symptomatic treatment of vasoplegia with catecholamines.
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Chronic venous diseases belong to the most frequent diseases. They can be asymptomatic, cause subjective symptoms or lead to objectif alterations, such as edema, cutaneous alterations and venous leg ulcers. This ultimately results in chronic venous insufficiency (CVI). ⋯ A varicose vein should be eliminated whenever possible. Stripping operations and the less invasive endovenous thermal ablation show comparable results for saphenous vein varicosis. Foam sclerotherapy and percutaneous phlebectomy are the methods of choice for elimination of side branch varicosis; however, recurrences of varicose veins are frequent.
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A possible classical complication of Crohn's disease is the formation of a stenosis, which can occur throughout the course of the disease and can present differently depending on the narrowing of the lumen. This article reports the case of a 39-year-old male patient with a stenosing terminal ileitis, which was ultimately only manifested after obstruction by a foreign body.
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Gastro-oesophageal reflux disease (GORD), a highly prevalent disease, is defined by troublesome symptoms and/or oesophageal lesions caused by reflux of gastric content. A diagnostic gold standard does not exist. A reliable diagnosis may be difficult in individual cases. ⋯ Proton pump inhibitors (PPI) are the drugs of first choice. In patients with insufficient PPI response, optimization of PPI therapy and/or combination with drugs having another mechanism of action are the available options. If PPIs are not sufficiently effective, not tolerated, or not wished antireflux procedures may be offered in specialized centers taking pathophysiological data into account.
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In the present case we report on a 51-year-old patient diagnosed with Cogan syndrome. This vasculitis of variable vessel size is a rare disease that poses a major challenge for the correct diagnostics and therapy. ⋯ A vascultis-related aortitis, an uncertain, more likely degenerative structure in combination with strongly elevated inflammation parameters was misinterpreted as infective endocarditis for a long time and treated with anti-infective medications. After diagnosis the patient recovered following treatment with high-dose steroids and in the further course cyclophosphamide and tumor necrosis factor‑α blockers.