Postoperative renal function evaluation, through RIFLE criteria, of elderly patients who underwent femur fracture surgery under spinal anesthesia

Introduction. The postoperative acute renal failure (ARF) incidence in different kinds of surgery has rarely been studied. Age, cardiac dysfunction, previous renal dysfunction, intraoperative hypoperfusion, and use of nephrotoxic medications are mentioned as risk factors for ARF at the postoperative period. The postoperative ARF definition was based on the creatinine increase by the RIFLE classification (R = risk, I = injury, F = failure, L = loss, E = end stage), which corresponds to a 1.5 creatinine increase, two to three times, respectively, above the basal value. This study aimed to evaluate the postoperative ARF incidence in elderly patients who underwent femur fracture surgery under subarachnoid anesthesia and stratify it by the RIFLE criteria. Methods. Ninety patients older than 65 years under spinal anesthesia with fixed dosage of 15 mg of 0.5% isobaric bupivacaine associated with morphine 50 g were studied. Immediate postoperative creatinine was considered basal and compared with maximal creatinine evaluated at 24, 48, and 72 postoperative hours. Results. The mean age of the patients was 80.27 years. ARF incidence was 24.44% and stratified this way: R = 21.11% and I = 3.33%. Conclusions. In conclusion, the postoperative ARF incidence after femur fracture surgery in patients over 65 years was 24.44%. By analyzing the stratification based on the RIFLE classification, the incidence was categorized as Risk (R) = 21.11% and Injury (I) = 3.33%.

Renal function evaluation in patients with American Cutaneous Leishmaniasis after specific treatment with pentavalent antimonial

Background: Renal evaluation studies are rare in American Cutaneous Leishmaniasis (ACL). The aim of this study is to investigate whether specific treatment reverts ACL-associated renal dysfunction. Methods: A prospective study was conducted with 37 patients with ACL. Urinary concentrating and acidification ability was assessed before and after treatment with pentavalent antimonial. Results: The patients mean age was 35.6 +/- 12 years and 19 were male. Before treatment, urinary concentrating defect (U/P-osm < 2.8) was identified in 27 patients (77%) and urinary acidification defect in 17 patients (46%). No significant glomerular dysfunction was observed before and after specific ACL treatment. There was no reversion of urinary concentrating defects, being observed in 77% of the patients before and in 88% after treatment (p = 0.344). Urinary acidification defect was corrected in 9 patients after treatment, reducing its prevalence from 40% before to only 16% after treament, (p = 0.012). Microalbuminuria higher than 30 mg/g was found in 35% of patients before treatment and in only 8% after treatment. Regarding fractional excretion of sodium, potassium, calcium, phosphorus and magnesium, there was no significant difference between pre and post-treatment period. Conclusion: As previously described, urinary concentrating and acidification defects were found in an important number of patients with ACL. Present results demonstrate that only some patients recover urinary acidification capacity, while no one returned to normal urinary concentration capacity.

Renal function evaluation in patients with American Cutaneous Leishmaniasis after specific treatment with pentavalent antimonial

Background Renal evaluation studies are rare in American Cutaneous Leishmaniasis (ACL). The aim of this study is to investigate whether specific treatment reverts ACL-associated renal dysfunction. Methods A prospective study was conducted with 37 patients with ACL. Urinary concentrating and acidification ability was assessed before and after treatment with pentavalent antimonial. Results The patients mean age was 35.6 ± 12 years and 19 were male. Before treatment, urinary concentrating defect (U/Posm <2.8) was identified in 27 patients (77%) and urinary acidification defect in 17 patients (46%). No significant glomerular dysfunction was observed before and after specific ACL treatment. There was no reversion of urinary concentrating defects, being observed in 77% of the patients before and in 88% after treatment (p = 0.344). Urinary acidification defect was corrected in 9 patients after treatment, reducing its prevalence from 40% before to only 16% after treament, (p = 0.012). Microalbuminuria higher than 30 mg/g was found in 35% of patients before treatment and in only 8% after treatment. Regarding fractional excretion of sodium, potassium, calcium, phosphorus and magnesium, there was no significant difference between pre and post-treatment period. Conclusion As previously described, urinary concentrating and acidification defects were found in an important number of patients with ACL. Present results demonstrate that only some patients recover urinary acidification capacity, while no one returned to normal urinary concentration capacity.

Parametrizable Architecture for Function Recursive Evaluation

Paper submitted to the XVIII Conference on Design of Circuits and Integrated Systems (DCIS), Ciudad Real, España, 2003.

Green tea (Camellia sinensis) catechins and vascular function

The health benefits of green tea (Camellia sinensis) catechins are becoming increasingly recognised. Amongst the proposed benefits are the maintenance of endothelial function and vascular homeostasis and an associated reduction in atherogenesis and CVD risk. The mounting evidence for the influential effect of green tea catechins on vascular function from epidemiological, human intervention and animal studies is subject to review together with exploration of the potential mechanistic pathways involved. Epigallocatechin-3-gallate, one of the most abundant and widely studied catechin found in green tea, will be prominent in the present review. Since there is a substantial inconsistency in the published data with regards to the impact of green tea catechins on vascular function, evaluation and interpretation of the inter- and intra-study variability is included. In conclusion, a positive effect of green tea catechins on vascular function is becoming apparent. Further studies in animal and cell models using physiological concentrations of catechins and their metabolites are warranted in order to gain some insight into the physiology and molecular basis of the observed beneficial effects.

Activation function study for wavelet network

The main purpose of this paper is to investigate theoretically and experimentally the use of family of Polynomial Powers of the Sigmoid (PPS) Function Networks applied in speech signal representation and function approximation. This paper carries out practical investigations in terms of approximation fitness (LSE), time consuming (CPU Time), computational complexity (FLOP) and representation power (Number of Activation Function) for different PPS activation functions. We expected that different activation functions can provide performance variations and further investigations will guide us towards a class of mappings associating the best activation function to solve a class of problems under certain criteria.

Evaluation of the Antihypertensive Properties of Yellow Passion Fruit Pulp (Passiflora edulis Sims f. flavicarpa Deg.) in Spontaneously Hypertensive Rats

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

A radial basis function network (RBFN) for function approximation

A radial basis function network (RBFN) circuit for function approximation is presented. Simulation and experimental results show that the network has good approximation capabilities. The RBFN was a squared hyperbolic secant with three adjustable parameters amplitude, width and center. To test the network a sinusoidal and sine function,vas approximated.

An analog implementation of radial basis function network appropriate for transducer linearizer

A circuit for transducer linearizer tasks have been designed and built using discrete components and it implements by: a Radial Basis Function Network (RBFN) with three basis functions. The application in a linearized thermistor showed that the network has good approximation capabilities. The circuit advantages is the amplitude, width and center.

Comparative study between powers of sigmoid functions, MLP-backpropagation and polynomials in function approximation problems

Function approximation is a very important task in environments where the computation has to be based on extracting information from data samples in real world processes. So, the development of new mathematical model is a very important activity to guarantee the evolution of the function approximation area. In this sense, we will present the Polynomials Powers of Sigmoid (PPS) as a linear neural network. In this paper, we will introduce one series of practical results for the Polynomials Powers of Sigmoid, where we will show some advantages of the use of the powers of sigmiod functions in relationship the traditional MLP-Backpropagation and Polynomials in functions approximation problems.

Parametrized Architecture for Hough Transform Recursive Evaluation

Paper submitted to International Workshop on Spectral Methods and Multirate Signal Processing (SMMSP), Barcelona, España, 2003.

Hough Transform recursive evaluation using Distributed Arithmetic

Paper submitted to the IFIP International Conference on Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI-SOC), Darmstadt, Germany, 2003.

Traditions and contradictions of sexual function definitions for portuguese heterosexual men and women: medicalization and socially constructed gender effects

© 2015 College of Sexual and Relationship Therapists

Older patients are immunocompromised by cytokine depletion and loss of innate immune function after hip fracture surgery

PURPOSE/INTRODUCTION: We have examined the immune status of elderly patients who underwent surgery for a hip fracture, an injury associated with poor postoperative outcomes, to identify specific immune defects. METHODS: In a cohort observational study, 16 patients undergoing surgery for hip fractures had immune function evaluation prior to surgery, and then at 3 and 7 days postoperatively, using flow cytometry for phenotype and for monocyte and granulocyte phagocytic function and respiratory burst. Serum samples were stored and batch analyzed using a human cytokine 25-plex panel. RESULTS: We report significant loss of innate immune function, related specifically to reduced granulocyte numbers by day 7 (P < .0001, flow cytometry; P < .05 white blood cells), and although granulocyte ability to take up opsonized Escherichia coli was increased (P < .05), the ability of those cells to generate a respiratory burst was reduced at days 3 and 7 (P < .05). Monocyte respiratory burst was also significantly reduced (P < .05). Serum cytokine levels indicated very poor T-cell function. CONCLUSION: We have demonstrated that the antimicrobial immune response is profoundly reduced after surgery in elderly patients with hip fractures. The effect was sustained up to 7 days postoperatively, identifying these patients as particularly vulnerable to bacterial infections.

Perception of affordances in multi-scale dynamics as an alternative explanation for equivalence of analogical and inferential reasoning in animals and humans

Recent claims of equivalence of animal and human reasoning are evaluated and a study of avian cognition serves as an exemplar of weaknesses in these arguments. It is argued that current research into neurobiological cognition lacks theoretical breadth to substantiate comparative analyses of cognitive function. Evaluation of a greater range of theoretical explanations is needed to verify claims of equivalence in animal and human cognition. We conclude by exemplifying how the notion of affordances in multi-scale dynamics can capture behavior attributed to processes of analogical and inferential reasoning in animals and humans.