Metachronous cancer of gastroplasty after esophagectomy

We reviewed two cases of adenocarcinoma of the gastric tube used for reconstruction after esophagectomy for cancer. The first case gastric cancer was detected during follow-up by endoscopic examination. Total resection of the gastric tube and reconstruction by Roux-en-Y was performed each time. The patient was alive and disease-free 1 year after surgery. In the second case the tumor was revealed via thoracic pain. Chemotherapy, using carboplatin-5-fluorouracil, was performed because of lung metastasis but the patient died 1 year later. The incidence of gastric tube cancer after esophagectomy has recently increased in conjunction with the lengthening of survival of esophageal cancer patients. The clinical symptoms related to tumors are associated with short-term survival, whereas the cancers detected by routine endoscopy screening have occasional long-term survival. Gastrectomy is proposed for surgical treatment but the operating procedure is complex with a high morbidity rate. Lesions detected at an early stage could be treated by minimally invasive surgery such as endoscopic mucosal resection.

Laparoscopic ventral hernia repair with the Goretex Dualmesh: long-term results and review of the literature

Since 1993 laparoscopy has become a popular technique of repair of ventral hernias. The authors review the long-term results of a systematic laparoscopic repair of ventral hernias and discuss the current problems compared to open repair. Between 1997 and 2003, 146 patients had a laparoscopic ventral hernia repair using an intraperitoneal Goretex Dualmesh with a 3-5-cm mesh overlap secured with a combination of nonabsorbable sutures and staples. A total of 155 attempts of laparoscopic repair was performed with four conversions. The 151 laparoscopic operations were completed in 105.8 min with a mesh implant being of 341 cm(2). There were two postoperative deaths and two patients had to be reoperated on. Mesh infection was diagnosed in two cases. Mean length of stay was 4.9 days. During a follow- up of 26.6 months eight patients (5.8%) developed a recurrence. Laparoscopic ventral hernia repair is a reproducible technique. Most of the comparative studies have shown an overall lower rate of complications after laparoscopic repair compared to open but with a 2-4% risk of bowel injury. The two other benefits of the laparoscopy are reduced postoperative pain and shorter hospital stay. The recurrence rate is usually between 2 and 7% but no difference has been found compared to open repair. Laparoscopic ventral hernia repair using the Goretex Dualmesh is a reliable operation with a low rate of conversion to open. Despite the risk of serious bowel injury, laparoscopy achieves as good results as the mesh open repair on the long term with the benefit of a decreased complication rate and a shorter hospital stay.

Lateral approach to laparoscopic repair of left diaphragmatic ruptures

Video-assisted repairs of traumatic diaphragmatic ruptures have been described where thoracoscopy or laparoscopy in the supine position were used. This study aims to validate a new lateral laparoscopic approach for left diaphragmatic repairs. Six consecutive patients were operated on for left diaphragmatic rupture using a lateral approach (Gagner's position). A series of 362 consecutive patients presenting with abdominal or thoracic trauma with or without diaphragmatic rupture over a 2-year period were reviewed retrospectively. Contraindications for immediate or delayed lateral laparoscopic approach were studied. The lateral approach provided complete visibility of the subdiaphragmatic space, easy reduction of herniated organs, easy thoracic inspection and cleaning, the use of low peritoneal pressure, full range of instrumental motion, and rapid diaphragmatic repair. No operative mortality or morbidity was noted. Altogether, 14% to 50% of the patients with diaphragmatic ruptures were candidates for immediate lateral laparoscopic repair. Associated spleen injury in 50% of the cases was the main contraindication. The lateral laparoscopic approach provides better exposure of the diaphragm on the left side and facilitates the diaphragmatic repair especially with a large herniation. Immediate repair is possible in selected cases (14-50%). There is no contraindication in case of delayed diagnosis.

Identification of prognostic factors determining risk groups for lung resection

BACKGROUND

Pulmonary resection belongs to a group of surgical procedures with significant morbidity and mortality. The aims of this study were to classify postoperative complications and to identify prognostic factors determining risk group.

METHODS

In a prospective study 500 patients undergoing lung resection (wedge resection, n = 141; lobectomies, n = 245; bilobectomies, n = 12; and pneumonectomies, n = 102) were included. In 178 patients (36%) pulmonary resections were extended to structures or thoracic organs. Sleeve resection of the bronchus to preserve lung parenchyma was performed in 22 patients.

RESULTS

Classification of postoperative complications fell into four categories: patients without postoperative complications; patients with moderate complications (n = 137); patients with severe complications (n = 38); and death (n = 33). Factors adversely affecting postoperative complications by multivariate analysis included pulmonary pathology, bronchoplastic technique, forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV1), extended resection, type of lung resection, comorbidity indices, and preoperative chemotherapy. Four risk groups were determined. Risk group I (n = 60) with the best prognosis included patients with FEV1 greater than or equal to 80% undergoing wedge resection for a benign lesion or metastasis. Risk group II (n = 161) included patients with FEV1 greater than or equal to 80% undergoing major pulmonary resection for a benign lesion or metastasis or lung cancer, or patients with FEV1 less than 80% undergoing wedge resection for benign lesion or metastasis. Risk group III (n = 233) with a fair prognosis included patients with comorbidity indices less than 4 and FEV1 greater than or equal to 80% undergoing extended pulmonary resection for a benign lesion or metastasis or lung cancer, or patients with FEV1 less than 80% and emphysema. Risk group IV (n = 46) with the worst prognosis included patients with FEV1 less than 80% undergoing an extended lung resection or bronchoplastic procedures for a benign lesion or metastasis or lung cancer, or patients with comorbidity indices greater than or equal to 4 undergoing extended lung resection for lung cancer.

CONCLUSIONS

In a prospective study, based on these prognostic factors, a practical, easy-to-use risk group system of lung resection is proposed as a tool to aid the decision to perform lung resection.

Visual and phonological codes in letter and word recognition: evidence from incremental priming

Critical issues in letter and word priming were investigated using the novel incremental priming technique. This technique adds a parametric manipulation of prime duration (or prime intensity) to the traditional design of a fast masked priming study. By doing so, additional information on the time course and nature of priming effects can be obtained. In Experiment 1, cross-case letter priming (a-A) was investigated in both alphabetic decision (letter/non-letter classification) and letter naming. In Experiment 2, cross-case word priming was investigated in lexical decision and naming. Whereas letter priming in alphabetic decision was most strongly determined by visual overlap between prime and target, word priming in lexical decision was facilitated by both orthographic and phonological information. Orthographic activation was stronger and occurred earlier than phonological activation. In letter and word naming, in contrast, priming effects were most strongly determined by phonological/articulatory information. Differences and similarities between letter and word recognition are discussed in the light of the incremental priming data.

Semantic and associative priming in picture naming

We report four picture-naming experiments in which the pictures were preceded by visually presented word primes. The primes could either be semantically related to the picture (e.g., "boat"--TRAIN: co-ordinate pairs) or associatively related (e.g., "nest"--BIRD: associated pairs). Performance under these conditions was always compared to performance under unrelated conditions (e.g., "flower"--CAT). In order to distinguish clearly the first two kinds of prime, we chose our materials so that (a) the words in the co-ordinate pairs were not verbally associated, and (b) the associate pairs were not co-ordinates. Results show that the two related conditions behaved in different ways depending on the stimulus-onset asynchrony (SOA) separating word and picture appearance, but not on how long the primes were presented. When presented with a brief SOA (114 ms, Experiment 1), the co-ordinate primes produced an interference effect, but the associated primes did not differ significantly from the unrelated primes. Conversely, with a longer SOA (234 ms, Experiment 2) the co-ordinate primes produced no effect, whereas a significant facilitation effect was observed for associated primes, independent of the duration of presentation of the primes. This difference is interpreted in the context of current models of speech production as an argument for the existence, at an automatic processing level, of two distinguishable kinds of meaning relatedness.

Reading aloud polysyllabic words and nonwords: the syllabic length effect reexamined

Two experiments were run in order to reinvestigate the role of the number of syllables in naming. Experiment 1 (word naming) showed that effects of number of syllables on naming latency were observed for very low-frequency words but not for high-frequency words (thus replicating Jared & Seidenberg's, 1990, finding). In Experiment 2 (nonword naming), syllabic length effects were also obtained for nonwords. Control experiments found no effect on the latency of delayed naming of the same words and nonwords. These results suggest that naming does require syllabic decomposition, at least for very low-frequency words and nonwords in French. In particular, these data are compatible with any model of reading that postulates that reading aloud depends on the activity of two procedures: (1) a procedure that operates in parallel across a letter string (and does not generate a strong syllabic length effect) and that is the predominant process in generating responses to high-frequency words, and (2) another procedure that operates serially across a letter string (and generates a strong syllabic length effect) and that is the predominant process in generating responses to very low-frequency words and nonwords. These results are discussed in the context of the multiple-trace memory model for polysyllabic word naming (Ans, Carbonnel, & Valdois, 1998).

L'annee psychologique: history of the founding of a 100-year-old

The authors present the history of the founding of the French journal L'Annee Psychologique. The names of Theodule Ribot (1839-1916), Henry Beaunis (1830-1921), and Alfred Binet (1857-1911) are closely associated with the journal. Ribot's election to the chair of Experimental and Comparative Psychology at the College de France in 1888 marked the official emancipation of psychology in France. Because there was no laboratory associated with the chair, Beaunis, a physiological psychologist from Nancy, proposed to Ribot the creation of the first French laboratory of experimental psychology (1889). Under Beaunis's direction, this laboratory was established at the Sorbonne in Paris but was in fact dependent on another educational institution, L'Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes. In 1893 the laboratory's research was first published in a yearly journal named Travaux du Laboratoire de Psychologie Physiologique (2 volumes: 1893-1894). Binet, who joined the laboratory in 1891, was not satisfied by the form of this publication. With Beaunis's agreement, he then created L'Annee Psychologique in 1894 to develop the reputation of the laboratory's research. The authors present the evolution and vicissitudes of the journal from 1895 to 1912, with a glance up to the present.

Wundt's laboratory at Leipzig in 1891

This article describes Wundt's laboratory at Leipzig in 1891 as viewed by a Belgian psychologist, J.J. Van Biervliet (1859-1945). Although few French-speaking psychologists worked in Wundt's laboratory, several of those who did reports wrote on how students were trained there. Van Biervliet decided to visit Wundt's laboratory at Leipzig in order to strengthen the foundation of his own laboratory at the University of Ghent and to become familiar with Wundt's experimental techniques. A translation of J.J. Van Biervliet's (1892) article "Experimental Psychology. Wundt's Institute at Leipzig" is presented here as one of the first and most complete articles in French describing the functioning of Wundt's laboratory.

A set of 400 pictures standardized for French: norms for name agreement, image agreement, familiarity, visual complexity, image variability, and age of acquisition

The present article provides French normative measures for 400 line drawings taken from Cycowicz, Friedman, Rothstein, and Snodgrass (1997), including the 260 line drawings that were normed by Snodgrass and Vanderwart (1980). The pictures have been standardized on the following variables: name agreement, image agreement, familiarity, visual complexity, image variability, and age of acquisition. These normative data also include word frequency values and the first verbal associate (taken from Ferrand & Alario, 1998). The six variables obtained are important because of their potential effect in many fields of psychology, especially the study of cognitive processes such as visual perception, language, and memory.

[Videocervicoscopy in surgery of primary hyperparathyroidism. Preliminary study of 19 patients]

The aim of this study was to assess the feasibility of a minimally invasive parathyroidectomy performed by videocervicoscopy. 19 patients were operated. Preoperative localization by ultrasonography and/or technetium 99 m sestamibi scan was performed in 17 patients. The technique was first attempted in two pigs, using three 2.5 mm trocars and a 2.5 mm endoscope. However, this technique failed in the first two human cases because of the lack of optical clarity of the 2.5 mm endoscope. A 5 mm endoscope was subsequently used. Carbon dioxide insufflation was maintained at 10 mmHg with a low 3 L/min flow. Three trocars were inserted in to the cervical space: one 5 mm trocar for the endoscope, two 3 mm trocars for the instruments. A unilateral neck exploration was carried out in 5 cases and a bilateral neck exploration in 14 cases. Enlarged glands were discovered in 13 patients (12 adenomas, 1 hyperplasia of the 4 glands). 8 adenomas were removed via a short midline incision, 4 others via a short lateral incision. Horizontal cervicotomy was required in 7 cases (4 failures to identify the abnormal gland, 1 thyroid cancer discovered incidentally, 1 hyperplasia of 4 glands and 1 anterior jugular vein bleeding). Except for the case of bleeding, no other complication occurred. Subcutaneous emphysema resorbed in 3 hours. 17 patients were discharged within 48 hours and 2 patients were discharged within 24 hours. 18 patients had normal serum calcium two months postoperatively. This study demonstrates that videocervicoscopy is safe and feasible in primary hyperparathyroidism.

Masked repetition and phonological priming in picture naming

We report a series of picture naming experiments in which target pictures were primed by briefly presented masked words. Experiment 1 demonstrates that the prior presentation of the same word prime (e.g., rose-ROSE) facilitates picture naming independently of the target's name frequency. In Experiment 2, primes that were homophones of picture targets (e.g., rows-ROSE) also produced facilitatory effects compared with unrelated controls, but priming was significantly larger for targets with low-frequency names relative to targets with high-frequency names. In Experiment 3, primes that were higher frequency homophones of picture targets produced facilitatory effects compared with identical primes. These results are discussed in relation to different accounts of the effects of masked priming in current models of picture naming.

The syllable's role in word naming

In a series of experiments, the masked priming paradigm with very brief prime exposures was used to investigate the role of the syllable in the production of English. Experiment 1 (word naming task) showed a syllable priming effect for English words with clear initial syllable boundaries (such as BALCONY), but no effect with ambisyllabic words targets (such as BALANCE, where the /l/belongs to both the first and the second syllables). Experiment 2 failed to show such syllable priming effects in the lexical decision task. Experiment 3 demonstrated that for words with clear initial syllable boundaries, naming latencies were faster only when primes formed the first syllable of the target, in comparison with a neutral condition. Experiment 4 showed that the two possible initial syllables of ambisyllabic words facilitated word naming to the same extent, in comparison with the neutral condition. Finally, Experiment 5 demonstrated that the syllable priming effect obtained for CV words with clear initial syllable boundaries (such as DIVORCE) was not due to increased phonological and/or orthographic overlap. These results, showing that the syllable constitutes a unit of speech production in English, are discussed in relation to the model of phonological and phonetic encoding proposed by Levelt and Wheeldon (1994).

The incremental priming technique: a method for determining within-condition priming effects

A novel priming technique is applied in two experiments using an alphabetic decision and a lexical decision task to study effects of repetition, and form-related priming on letter and word recognition. The incremental priming technique consists of a gradual increase of the prime's informational value (operationalized as prime intensity). The minimum prime-intensity level serves as a within-condition baseline for each priming condition. Thus, we can define any priming effect with respect to two baseline conditions: one is the minimum-intensity condition of the particular priming condition (within-condition baseline), and the other is a different priming condition (across-condition baseline). This double-baseline approach makes measuring of priming effects more reliable and imposes stronger constraints on our interpretations of these effects.

A study of masked form priming in picture and word naming

We report a series of picture- and word-naming experiments in which the masked priming paradigm with prime exposures brief enough to prevent prime identification were used. Experiment 1 demonstrates that the prior presentation of the same word prime facilitates both picture and word naming independently of target frequency. In Experiments 2 and 3, primes that were pseudohomophones of picture targets produced facilitatory effects compared with orthographic controls, but these orthographically similar nonword primes did not facilitate picture naming compared with unrelated controls. On the other hand, word targets were primarily facilitated by orthographic prime-target overlap. This marked dissociation in the priming effects obtained with picture and word targets is discussed in relation to different explanations of masked form priming effects in visual word recognition and current models of picture and word naming.

Effects of orthography are independent of phonology in masked form priming

Briefly presented forward-masked primes that share letters with a word target have been shown to facilitate performance in different word recognition tasks. However, in all the experiments that have previously reported these facilitatory effects, related primes not only shared more letters with the target than did unrelated primes (orthographic priming), but they also shared more phonemes (phonological priming). The stimuli used in the present experiments allow us to separate out the effects of orthographic priming from phonological priming. Varying prime exposure duration from 14 to 57 msec, it is shown that effects of orthography follow a distinct time-course from the effects of phonology, and that orthographic facilitation does not result from a confound with phonological prime-target overlap.

Phonology and orthography in visual word recognition: evidence from masked non-word priming

Three lexical decision experiments in French investigated the effects of briefly presented forward-masked non-word primes on latencies to phonologically and/or orthographically related targets. At 64-msec prime presentation durations, primes that are pseudohomophones of the target produced facilitatory effects compared to orthographic controls, but these orthographically similar non-word primes did not facilitate target recognition compared to unrelated controls. These results were obtained independently of target word frequency and independently of the presence or absence of pseudohomophone targets in the experimental lists. With a 32-msec prime duration, on the other hand, pseudohomophone and orthographic primes had similar effects on target recognition, both producing facilitation relative to unrelated controls. The results are discussed in terms of the time course of phonological and orthographic code activation in the processing of pronounceable strings of letters.