Biomedical subjects
Publications and source records attributed to M Arcas.
We report the case of a 29-year-old woman with congenital myotony who underwent cesarean section under intradural anesthesia with 0.5% hyperbaric bupivacaine plus fentanyl. We describe the behavior of the anesthetic used as well as the implications this condition has for the anesthesiologist.
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A case is presented of a female patient with Wolff-Parkinson-White Syndrome in whom controlled arterial hypotension was required for the clipping of a posterior communicating artery aneurysm. The anaesthetic management is described, and the authors discuss the use of diverse drugs, based on the data provided by the electrophysiological study.
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Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
One pre- and two postoperative cultures of tracheo-bronchial secretions were obtained from 28 cardiac patients, subjected to open-heart surgery. Four patients received preoperative antibiotics, and all but one received postoperative prophylactic antibiotics. Preoperatively, only one patient had potential pathogens; after surgery (mean intubation time 4.2 h), four patients (14.3%) had organisms; and after 19 h of intubation, 28% of the patients had potential pathogens in their tracheo-bronchial secretions. Only three of the seven organisms recovered from the last sample were clearly sensitive to the antibiotics given prophylactically; and two of these organisms were Group A beta-haemolytic streptococci. The early presence of organisms in the airways after intubation, the high incidence of colonization, and the ineffectiveness of prophylactic antibiotics in preventing this contamination are pointed out. The factors that may possibly influence colonization of airways among these patients are commented on.
We report the use of left ventricular assistance with a centrifugal pump in a patient with refractory left ventricular failure after aortic valve replacement. Assistance was maintained during the first 24 hours until the hemodynamic status allowed its withdrawal. The used flows ranged from 1.5 to 5 l/min, and there were no complications except hemorrhage (95 ml in 3 hours) that could be stopped without reoperation.
The anaesthetic management of 41 patients who underwent cardiac transplantation during a 40 month period at Clínica Puerta de Hierro is reviewed. The study includes the preoperative assessment, anaesthetic agents used and intraoperative incidences. The anaesthesia was induced with etomidate whereas a high-dose fentanyl, supplemented with diazepam, was the most commonly anaesthetic technique used. There was no intraoperative mortality in this series. Several interesting concerns related to the physiology of the denervated heart and the effects of vasoactive agents after extracorporeal circulation are reviewed.
A 31 years old woman with a terminal phase dilated cardiomyopathy and a ventricular ejection fraction of 0.12 was admitted to our hospital to be included in the cardiac transplantation program. When entering the hospital her condition worsened and she suffered an electromechanical dissociation that needed cardiopulmonary resuscitation. Few hours later, energetic medical treatment could not improve her haemodynamic situation. Having no adequate organ available for emergency transplantation, a total orthotopic prosthesis (Jarvik-7-70) implantation was decided. Anesthesia was maintained with fentanyl (50 micrograms/kg), droperidol (0.23 mg/kg) and diazepam (0.25 mg/kg). There were no incidents during or after extracorporeal circulation bypass; despite the use of furosemide (100 mg) and mannitol (1 g/kg) diuresis was less than 40 ml/h. After by-pass, pulmonary hypertension was observed and treated with sodium nitroprusside (1 microgram/kg/min) and isoproterenol (5 micrograms/kg/min), as well as increasing the right ventricle working pressure of the device from 40 to 70 mmHg, obtaining haemodynamic stabilization and good tissular perfusion. After operation, the patient arrived to the Recovery Unit in a steady situation, with a cardiac index of 2.87 l/min/m2 and a diuresis of 150 ml/h. Some other aspects of the anaesthetic management are also discussed in this paper.
A 12-year-old child with terminal ischemic heart disease as a result of homozygotous familial type IIa hypercholesterolemia received an orthotopic heart transplant and, 21 days later, an orthotopic liver transplant. Six months after heart transplantation, the patient is asymptomatic and evidences normal liver function and cholesterol levels; there are no signs of heart rejection. To our knowledge, this is the first instance of two-step heart-liver transplantation with organs from different donors.
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