[Fast pathway for heart surgery]. / Vía rápida para cirugía cardiaca.

The increasing demographic and life expectancy rates, together with the vertiginous technological development during the last two decades, have raised the number of cardiac patients requiring surgical treatment. Therefore, several institutions have been forced to give priority to advanced or more serious cases and to postpone those that do not demand an urgent surgery. This analysis was made from June 15, 1999 to June 15, 2000 and demonstrates the results obtained from maintaining a fast track at the National Institute of Cardiology "Ignacio Chávez". This has favored the practice of surgeries in cases with noncomplex pathologies, null mortality, and low morbidity rates. The analysis also compares results from patients who had been subjected to surgery for the same type of pathologies but following the usual course of admittance and surgery scheduling, proving to be cost-efficient. It also demonstrates the high incidence of inter-auricular communication and the Von Willebrand disease that exist in our environment. Based on the results, we propose to maintain and increase this type of surgeries, addressing their limitations.

Distribution of pore sizes in black lipid membranes treated with nystatin.

Resistance changes were measured on artificial membranes made of oxidized cholesterol and treated with nystatin. The experimental data were smoothed and then fitted to a mixture of Gaussian functions using the maximum likelihood method; the best fit was to a mixture of four gaussians centered approximately at 4, 6, 9 and 12 molecules per pore, leading to the conclusion that these are the most likely pore sizes.

[Policy guidelines and practical considerations for the development of technology at the Instituto Nacional de Cardiología de México]. / Lineamientos doctrinarios y consideraciones prácticas para el desarrollo de tecnología que se realiza en el Instituto Nacional de Cardiología de México.

In order to face the current economical problems of the country, our Institute has intensified its efforts to replace the imports of medical goods by developing its own medical technology. This article summarizes what we have achieved in this field and describes the rules to be followed in the future. We describe the program on the designing and development of heart valve prosthesis together with an hydraulic-electrical system to test them. In the field of computed instruments, we have developed a system of "synchronos color pictures" to be applied in nuclear medicine. In the field of electrocardiography; an EKG paste, a computed program for automatic EKG interpretation and a "filter" of the 60 cycle interference. The Institute is engaged in the designing of a sophisticated EKG machine at low cost, and EKG tracing simulator for teaching purposes. These programs have been shared with others institutions of the country.