[A comprehensive study of heart function in patients with systemic scleroderma]. / Kompleksnoe izuchenie sostoianiia serdtsa u bol'nykh sistemnoi sklerodermiei.

The data of instrumental studies in 43 patients with systemic scleroderma were compared to the clinical picture, which made it possible to specify the character and to reveal new regularities of heart lesions in patients with the above disease. The instrumental research methods, echo- and polycardiography in particular, allow an objective control of heart lesions in systemic scleroderma which should be specified in making the diagnosis and in the course of the follow-up of patients.

[Systemic lupus erythematosus in the native inhabitants of Tadzhikistan]. / Sistemnaia krasnaia volchanka u korennykh zhitelei Tadzhikistana.

A total of 106 patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) underwent clinico-laboratory comparative studies. There were 3 groups of patients. Of these, 43 patients were examined in Moscow, 34 natives of Tadzhikistan (Tadzhiks and Uzbeks), and 29 patients belonging to the nonindigenous population were examined in Dushanbe. For estimation purposes use was made of routine clinical-instrumental and laboratory methods including the determination of antinuclear factor (ANF). The clinicoimmunological features of SLE seen in the natives of Tadzhikistan consisted in a more frequent demonstration of facial erythema, arthritis, oral ulcerations and clinical criteria for ARA on the whole; in a rarer demonstration of capillaritis, serositis, and laboratory criteria for ARA including ANF. SLE patients belonging to the non-indigenous population of Tadzhikistan occupy an intermediate place between SLE patients belonging to the indigenous population and patients living in Moscow. By their clinico-laboratory parameters, however, they are closer to the Moscow group patients excluding the age at which the disease occurs. In the nonindigenous population of Tadzhikistan, the disease appeared to start 10 years later. The clinico-laboratory differences as well as those in the age of the disease onset in the indigenous and nonindigenous population of Tadzhikistan form the basis for elaborating the medical and social measures with a purpose of goal-oriented identification of factors at risk for the development of SLE in Tadzhikistan bearing in mind the ethnic characteristics.