[Pseudo-Conn's syndrome after habitual ingestion of liquorice. Report on various clinical cases]. / Pseudo-sindrome di Conn da ingestione abituale di liquirizia. Rapporto su alcuni casi clinici.

Four female subjects were admitted to our Department for a form of severe systo-diastolic hypertension, recalcitrant to previous anti-hypertensive treatment, accompanied by marked hypokalemia. Patients had a common history of the continuous use, for pleasure or medicinal purposes, of liquorice-based preparations. In all cases, suspension led to normalisation of kalemia in a period varying from six to fifteen days, while arterial pressure values and all other essential parameters examined (plasma reninic activity, aldosteronuria, etc.) recovered their balance more slowly.

[Seminal fluid today]. / Il liquido seminale oggi.

Semen analysis is still today a fundamental stage in male fertility diagnosis. In fact it's essential to evaluate didimal functional state and particularly the sperm genesis. But a semen analysis with normal parameters does not assure male fertility. Except the cases of azoospermia it does not distinguishes fertile from infertile patients, but when the sperm quality decrease, the pregnancy rate also decrease but rarely touch zero. Reliability of the analysis depends on the experience and on the analyst's ability who has to give an opinion about fundamental parameters like motility and sperm morphology. It is most correct to talk about semen analysis instead of semen examination because is possible to obtain not only number and quality of spermatozoa but also hormonal, immunological, bacteriological, cytogenetic, biomolecular data. Furthermore in the last ten years a lot of functional tests have been perfected, able to value accurately the integrity of some spermatozoa's "functional compartments" like membrane, acrosoma, DNA, nuclear proteins but these examinations have been considered at level assessment only for select cases. Semen analysis remains therefore a fundamental examinations in the study of male infertility even if rarely it is able to express definitive trials about infertility. In fact this always represents a couple problem, particularly of the couple in study.

[Etiopathogenesis of benign prostatic hypertrophy]. / Eziopatogenesi dell'ipertrofia prostatica benigna.

The pathogenesis of benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) remains largely unresolved. The natural history of the disease involves two distinct phases, a pathological and a clinical one, whose pathogenesis is different. The pathologic phase is composed of two stages microscopic and macroscopic neither of which produces clinical dysuria. Nearly all men develop microscopic BPH if they live long enough but only in 50% of men microscopic BPH grows to produce a macroscopic enlargement of the gland and the evolvement happens in a period between 5 and 7 years. So different etiologies for the microscopic and macroscopic evolution of prostate can be argued. The clinical phase of BPH involves the progression of pathologic BPH to the clinical form in which the patients develop symptomatic dysuria. Again only about 50% of the men with macroscopic BPH progress to the clinical form: although macroscopic enlargement of the prostate is necessary for the development of clinical BPH it is not sufficient by itself for the progression to clinical phase and additional factors are required such as phlogosis, vascular infarct, enanchement of alpha adrenergic tone. These remarks on natural history suggest a multiple approach to BPH not addressed to treat the pathologic phase but the clinical one.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

[Surgery in day hospital: scrotal surgery]. / Chirurgia in Day Hospital: chirurgia scrotale.

Actually scrotal ambulatory surgery represents a necessity for the surgeon because of the more and more greatest request to admittance and because of the impossibility to admit patients with less severe diseases. Ambulatory treatments allows psychological advantage, less discomfort, less hospital complications for the patients and a reduction of sanitary expense. Light general anaesthesia with concomitant administration of local anaesthesia is performed in our Institute. Surgical treatment must be short, with low haemorragic risk, scarcely algogenic and aseptic. Since January 1994 till December 1997, 484 patients underwent scrotal ambulatory surgery in our Institute. We reported one cardiac black and two lypothymia attacks associated with anaesthesia. Therefore combined general anaesthesia results a valid technique but unvoid of complications. Ambulatory surgery for scrotal surgery represents a sure advantage for patients and for the sanitary expense.

[Validity of superficial echography in the study of urethral pathology]. / Validità dell'ecografia di superficie nello studio della patologia uretrale.

In male patients routine examination for urethral disease includes retrograde and anterograde urethrography and urethroscopy. In the patients underwent radical cystectomy, detection of cancerous cells in the urethral washing suggest cancer relapse. Nowadays we can achieve a sonographic study of the anterior male urethra, using a superficial high frequency ultrasound probe. Since September 1992 till July 1993, 12 patients underwent cystectomy at our Institution and 13 patients affected by urethral stricture, have been investigated by routine examination and sonographic urethrogram. In the first group of patients, out of 3 patients with urethral tumor, sonourethrography has confirmed the presence of tumor in 2 cases. In these second group of patients, sonourethrography has located the stricture, evaluated the length, calculated the diameter of the stricture and the depth of fibrosis. Sonourethrography is a non-invasive method that can provide valuable information about the urethral lumen and the urethral wall.

[Recovery of urinary incontinence after retropubic radical prostatectomy. Results in 100 patients]. / Ripresa della continenza urinaria dopo prostatectomia radicale retropubica. Risultati in 100 pazienti.

AIM OF THE STUDY: To shorten the time to recovery of full urinary continence after radical retropubic prostatectomy and to increase the postoperative continence rate. MATERIALS AND METHODS: One hundred and five consecutive patients were submitted to radical retropubic prostatectomy for prostate cancer, with curative intent, focusing our attention on three steps of the operation. First, to achieve a complete control of bleeding from the dorsal vein complex and to perform a minimal touch dissection of the urethral stump; second, to perform a conservative dissection of the bladder neck, and, third, to implement a vascular type, watertight, vesico urethral anastomosis. Continence was assessed 24 hours after catheter removal and at monthly follow up visits until full recovery and graded as dry if no dropping was visible and the patient was able to interrupt the urinary stream during micturition; stress incontinence, if any dropping was observed during abdominal strain between micturitions; and wet, if uncontrollable dropping occurred, and the number of pads needed per day recorded. RESULTS: At a median follow-up time of 18 months, range 6 to 30, a total of 87 of 100 evaluable patients (87%) resulted as dry; 10 patients (10%) resulted as having a variable degree of stress incontinence needing one to three pads per day, and 3 patients (3%) resulted as wet. In 41 of the 87 dry patients (47.1%) continence was achieved within the first day from catheter removal, and in a median time of 4 weeks, range 2 to 16 in the remaining 46 patients (52.9%). CONCLUSIONS: The results of total continence rate of the present study seem to compare to the recent literature except for the time to full recovery which is shorter; it is difficult to identify the contribution of each single surgical step.

Contact laser treatment for benign prostatic hypertrophy.

Transurethral resection of the prostate (TURP) is still the standard treatment of benign prostatic hypertrophy (BPH) but the surgical lasers recently introduced seem to offer the patient a very low perioperative complication rate, a short learning curve, the reduced operating time and the health care system a very low cost/benefit ratio. We report our personal experience with contact vaporizing laser ablation of the prostate (CLAP) paying attention to efficacy, safety and costs. Between December 94 and March 97, 67 pts (mean age 62.8 +/- 9 years) underwent CLAP for BPH (mean prostate volume 40.4 +/- 17.1 cc). Five pts presented coagulation disorders, five were renal transplant recipients and one had chronic renal failure requiring peritoneal dialysis. All patients were preoperatively submitted to digital rectal examination, transrectal prostatic ultrasound, dosage of serum PSA, determination of the International Prostatic Symptom Score (IPSS), the post voiding residual urine and maximum flow rate. All these exams were repeated at 1, 3, 6, 12 and 24 months after CLAP. The bladder pressure at maximum flow (Pdet-Qmax) was preoperatively determined in 23 patients and repeated at the six months follow up. For CLAP we used an SLT neodynium-YAG laser or diode laser with maximum potency 60 W. For statistical analysis we used Student's t-test for paired data. The mean operating time was 47.9 +/- 12.5 min (range 18-75 min) and the laser energy averaged 17.707 +/- 11.239 J (range 3000-58,000 J). The mean catheter time after CLAP was 2.5 days and the mean hospital stay was 4.8 days. No intraoperative complications occurred. Two patients 48/72 h after surgery presented macrohematuria requiring laser revision, three patients presented an acute urinary retention post catheter removal and one patient had acute prostatis. At the follow up, the IPSS score, Q max, Pdet-Qmax and PVU showed a significant statistical difference respect to baseline values. The prostate volume at the 180-day follow up was not significantly different from baseline values (42.1 +/- 16.8 cc vs 40.4 +/- 17.1 cc). Contact laser ablation of the prostate has been demonstrated to be efficacious and comparable to TURP in relieving BPH obstruction however the higher costs exceeding the TURP ones by 13%, the longer operative times and the lower durability of laser disobstruction impede to replace TURP with the CLAP.

Clinical value of ambulatory blood pressure monitoring.

This report reviews the evidence for and against clinical use of ambulatory blood pressure monitoring (ABPM) on a large scale. Such monitoring is supported by a number of data, among which is that the end-organ damage associated with hypertension correlates more with 24-h average blood pressure than with clinic blood pressure, the correlation becoming even closer with addition of blood pressure variability values. However, the evidence thus far collected is largely cross-sectional. Furthermore, ABPM devices have limited accuracy and the procedure has a high cost. Therefore, while prospective studies on the prognostic value of ambulatory blood pressure are awaited, use of this approach should be restricted to a limited number of clinical circumstances (e.g., identification of white-coat hypertension) and used only in specialized centers.

Upper gastrointestinal involvement in diabetes mellitus: study of esophagogastric function.

The aim of our study was to evaluate in 18 diabetic patients (11 with and 7 without evidence of autonomic neuropathy as revealed by common cardiovascular tests) alterations indicative of autonomic nervous involvement of the gastrointestinal tract, independently of the presence of suggestive symptoms. All patients, without evidence of obstructive or mucosal pathology of the upper gastrointestinal tract, underwent the following: 1) study of gastric emptying time of nonabsorbable radiopaque markers (90, 120, 150 and 210 min); 2) study of gastric acid secretion: basal (BAO) and peak (PAO) acid output after sham-feeding (PAOSF) and peak acid output after pentagastrin (PAOPENT).PAOSF/PAOPENT ratio is an index of vagal integrity; 3) esophageal manometry. Our data confirm that a delayed gastric emptying of undigestible solids is a frequent finding in diabetic subjects. This was highly significant (p less than 0.01) at 150 min after a standard meal, in patients with signs of autonomic neuropathy and was often associated with asymptomatic esophageal motor abnormalities. No correlation was found with index of vagal integrity, hormonal pattern and degree of glycemic control. Autonomic neuropathy cannot be considered the only explanation for gastric and esophageal abnormalities in decompensated diabetes.

A clinical study of the pineal hormone melatonin in patients with growth hormone or prolactin secreting pituitary tumours.

OBJECTIVES: Despite the well documented influence of the pineal gland on pituitary function, the evaluation of pineal activity is not generally included in the clinical investigation of patients with pituitary tumours. The present study analyzed the circadian secretion of melatonin, the main pineal hormone, in patients with pituitary adenomas. METHODS: The study included 36 patients with pituitary tumours (acromegaly: 11; prolactinoma: 25), by comparing the results with those seen in 42 healthy controls. Moreover, patients were endocrinologically investigated after oral administration of 10 mg of melatonin. RESULTS: Abnormally high serum levels of melatonin during the period of maximum light and abnormally low increases during the night were seen in 7/36 and 16/36 patients, respectively, without any relation to tumour histotype. Moreover, night serum mean levels of melatonin were significantly lower in patients than in controls. Finally, the exogenous administration of melatonin did not influence growth hormone and prolactin secretions in patients with acromegaly and prolactinomas, respectively. CONCLUSION: This study demonstrates the existence of an altered pineal function in patients with pituitary tumours. Further studies will be required to establish the pathogenetic and prognostic significance of pineal disorders in neoplastic disease of the pituitary gland.

A survey of the necessity of the hospitalization day in an Italian teaching hospital.

To assess the extent of inappropriate hospital use in an adult in-patients population we used a modified version of the Appropriateness Evaluation Protocol (A.E.P.) to evaluate retrospectively a cross-section of 273 patient-days in a large teaching hospital in the Greater Milan area. Overall, 41% were judged to represent inappropriate hospital use on the basis of the protocol's criteria. The rate of inappropriate hospital use was significantly associated with admitting specialty, ranging from 12% for surgery, to 20% for cardiology and to about 60% in psychiatric, geriatrics and neurology departments (p less than 0.01). Hospital days of patients with longer stays were more frequently inappropriate: a statistically significant trend of inappropriateness emerged ranging from 30% among patients with total length of stay (LOS) of 1-10 days to 60% among those with LOS greater than 30 days (p less than 0.01). This study confirms that there is a substantial rate of unnecessary use of hospitals but that such inappropriateness does not seem in most cases to be easily modifiable through "simple" organizational changes.