Articles: function.
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Pulmonary complications are a major cause of peri-operative morbidity and mortality, but have been researched less thoroughly than cardiac complications. It is important to try and predict which patients are at risk of peri-operative pulmonary complications and to intervene to reduce this risk. Anaesthetists are in a unique position to do this during the whole peri-operative period. Pre-operative training, smoking cessation and lung ventilation with tidal volumes of 6-8 ml.kg(-1) and low positive end-expiratory pressure probably reduce postoperative pulmonary complications.
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Cognition may decline after surgery. Postoperative delirium, especially when hyperactive, may be easily recognised, whereas cognitive dysfunction is subtle and can only be detected using neuropsychological tests. ⋯ Postoperative cognitive disorders are associated with increased mortality and permanent disability. Peri-operative interventions can reduce the rate of delirium in the elderly, but in spite of promising findings in animal experiments, no intervention reduces postoperative cognitive dysfunction in humans.
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Critical care medicine · Jan 2016
Neutrophil Toll-Like Receptor 9 Expression and the Systemic Inflammatory Response in Acetaminophen-Induced Acute Liver Failure.
There is a marked propensity for patients with acetaminophen-induced acute liver failure to develop sepsis, which may culminate in multiple organ failure and death. Toll-like receptors sense pathogens and induce inflammatory responses, but whether this is protective or detrimental in acetaminophen-induced acute liver failure remains unknown. ⋯ These data point to neutrophil Toll-like receptor 9 expression in acetaminophen-induced acute liver failure being mediated both by circulating endogenous DNA as well as ammonia and interleukin-8 in a synergistic manner inducing systemic inflammation, neutrophil exhaustion, and exacerbating hepatic encephalopathy.
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Accelerated aging has been proposed as a pathologic mechanism of various chronic diseases, including COPD. This concept has almost exclusively been approached by analyses of individual markers. We investigated whether COPD is associated with accelerated aging using a panel of markers representing various interconnected aspects of the aging process. ⋯ Markers of the aging mechanism represent distinct molecular aspects of aging. Among them, different markers were altered in COPD, but only telomere length was consistently associated with lung function, and seems a useful marker for expressing accelerated aging in COPD.
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Patients with traumatic brain injury (TBI) need frequent computed tomography (CT) of the head for assessment and management. In view of the associated polytrauma, hemodynamic instability, and various in-dwelling catheters and tubes, shifting of patients for CT scans may be difficult. ⋯ A mobile CT has considerably changed the management response time in the neurosurgical intensive care unit (ICU) setup and decreased patient transfer times and the associated complications. Inclusion of a mobile CT scanner in the armamentarium of a neurosurgeon as a "bedside tool" can dramatically change decision making and the response time. It should be considered as the standard of care in any large-volume emergency department or neurosurgical facility.