[Some observations on prognosis in congenital hydrocephalus (second report) -with reference to the physical handicap in survival cases (author's transl)]

The prognosis of surgically treated congenital hydrocephalus has lately proven to give a remarkably increased expectation of life for patient. However, numerous reports hve shown that the prognosis of congenital hydrocephalus have not always shown favourable turns from the viewpoints of physical and mental disability. This problem has been considered many times over the past years. But, an important problem has been left unsolved. The children of social and physical disability are most serious problem, so we attempt to obain a new interpretation about the influence factors upon the prognosis. Present report consists of follow-up studies of long surviving patients who have studied the fatty acid metabolism in the cerebrospinal fluid during postoperatively, the influeence on prognosis of complicated central nervous system malformation and discussed motor and mental disability in survival cases. Since lipids are essential factors in composing the brain tissues, quantitative composition of fatty acid inC.S.F. was determined by the method of gaschromatography using the arachidic acid as an indicator...

Radioligand receptor assay for urinary and serum hCG

A radioligand receptor assay system for urinary hCG and serum hCG was developed, using 1100-2000 times g fractions of homogenates of pig testis. This method is specific for hCG and LH, and the limit of detection for hCG was 20 mIU, which could be significantly discriminated from zero at the 95% confidence level. A nonspecific inhibition reaction which exerts its influence on the assay system has been found in the urine and serum, and in performing assays for urinary and serum hCG, it was necessary to remove the inhibition reaction by diluting the urine more than eight fold or subject the serum to an extraction procedure. Since the hCG of normal pregnancy and trophoblastic neoplasia showed a dose response curve similar to that of the International Standard hCG, it became clear that these hCG could be assayed with this method. The potency ratio R/I measured by RRA and RIA of urinary hCG and serum hCG was different from those of normal pregnancy and trophoblastic neoplasia.

[Clinical experiences of lividomycin on respiratory tract infections (author's transl)]

Clinical effects of a newly developed aminoglycoside antibiotic lividomycin, were investigated in 13 patients suffering from respiratory infections. 1. A total of 13 patients with the following infectious diseases was treated with 1 g/day of lividomycin for 3 to 11 days (average 6.7 days): Acute pneumonia 3 cases, bronchiectasis 3 cases, acute bronchitis 5 cases, suppurative diseases of the lung 1 case, and pyothorax 1 case. As the results, the antibiotic was effective in 5 patients, moderately effective in 4 patients and ineffective in 4 patients, and thus the global effective rate was 62.9% (9/13). 2. As in the case of kanamycin, lividomycin indicated fairly good sensitivity against a total of 17 strains comprising Staphylococcus aureus (7 strains), alpha-Streptococcus (2 strains), beta-Streptococcus (3 strains), gamma-Streptococcus (1 strain), Neisseria (2 strains) and Haemophilus (2 strains) which were isolated from sputum. 3. No side effects attributable to lividomycin were observed.

[Some observations on prognosis in congenital hydrocephalus (first report)--with reference to the preoperative evaluation of the hydrocephalic infants (author's transl)]

Recently, the prognosis of congenital hydrocephalus has improved by shunting operation. There are some cases, however, showing poor prognosis even when this procedure has been performed. Thus, postoperative courses of hydrocephalus are variable, and do not always produce the same results. From the clinical viewpoint, we have studied preoperative signs and symptoms, and tried to find some factors which influence the prognosis. This report consists of 41 cases of congenital hydrocephalus and 7 cases of hydroencephalodysplasia over the past six years. For the purpose of observations before and after operation, we adopted some neurological symptoms, head circumference, thickness of cerebral mantle in pneumoventriculogram, intraventricular pressure and others. The average period of follow up of all the cases was two years and six months. Of the 41 patients of congenital hydrocephalus, 24 survived and 14 died. Of the 7 patients of hydroencephalodysplasia, 5 survived and 2 died. As to the age of the patients on admission, 57% of all the cases were infants from 2 months to 4 months old. The patients who had such neurological signs already on admission as motor disability, opisthotonic posture and severe optic nerve atrophy, had a tendency to show poor prognosis in general and to result in a higher mortality. The convulsion and so-called setting sun sign had no significant correlation to poor prognosis. From the morphological evaluation, we have examined increase of circumference and enlargement rate of the head. In the death group, abnormal increase of head circumference was recognized within the first three months of life. When the enlargement was higher than Nellhaus's standard rate within four months after birth, over half of the cases died. In the survival cases, the cerebral mantle thickness was found to be variable while a remarkable decrease was often noted in the death cases. If the mantle is less than 14 mm within three months after birth, prognosis of these cases was generally poor. In the evaluation of intraventricular pressure under endotracheal anesthesia, we found little difference between the survival cases and death cases. However, the death cases exhibited slightly higher average intraventricular pressure. In hydroencephalodysplasia, the cases with abnormal enlarged head marked dysplasia of cerebral hemisphere and thin cerebral cortex showed a tendency toward death, however, the cases with localized partial brain or a lobe dysplasia survived. In some cases by using the ventriculoscope, we could see directly the defect of the brain and obtain beneficial information on diagnosis. Due to the influence of various factors, it is impossible to predict or decide exactly the prognosis of congenital hydrocephalus before operation, but it is of critical necessity to anticipate the postoperative prognosis from preoperative synthetic information.