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Drug eluting stents (DES) wire mesh tubes that prop open a previously blocked artery to the heart have gone a long way toward reducing restenosis in cardiac patients after percutaneous coronary intervention. But they've also created a host of potential complications from impairing imaging to hindering surgical revascularization or positive remodeling (an increase in arterial area).
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Life Recovery Systems (Alexandria, Louisiana) reported FDA approval of an Investigational Device Exemption (IDE) application to investigate rapid hypothermia treatment in combination with primary angioplasty to treat heart attacks.
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Although the incidence of catheter-related bloodstream infections from arterial catheters is low, arterial catheters have similar colonization rates and catheter-related bloodstream infections as concurrently sited and identically managed central venous catheters.
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Stenotrophomonas maltophilia (formerly known as Pseudomonas maltophilia, Xanthomonas maltophilia) is a motile, gram-negative bacillus that is widely distributed in nature, particularly in water and soil. It rarely causes disease in healthy hosts, but it can be a particularly troublesome pathogen in highly compromised, hospitalized patients.
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A physicians' survey in Connecticut indicates that a patient's socioeconomic status (SES) affected their clinical management decisions.
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Left main coronary artery stenosis is one of the primary indications for coronary artery bypass graft surgery (CABG). Recently, a number of non-randomized studies and registries have suggested that stenting, using current techniques and devices, may be a feasible alternative to CABG.
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This single-center, prospective, observational study finds that the utility of a routine daily chest x-ray (CXR) for an ICU patient is quite limited. A change in practice to ordering CXR only when clinically indicated did not adversely impact patient outcome, but reduced CXR volume and overall costs.
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For many patients, a diagnosis of cancer is the beginning of a series of stressful events. Uncertainty about long-term prognosis, changes in work and personal relationships, and the basic unpredictability of the disease compound the anxiety and discomfort associated with treatment.
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The confusion over what constitutes effective echinacea preparations for the treatment of colds and influenza is demonstrated in several recent reviews addressing this issue.