Bradykinin is increased during acute and chronic inflammation: therapeutic implications.

Bradykinin is a potent pain-producing substance, yet little is known about its role in inflammation. The present study measured circulating levels of immunoreactive bradykinin in a clinical model of acute inflammation (oral surgery) and chronic inflammation (rheumatoid arthritis) and in the rat carrageenan model of inflammation. The effects of a kallikrein inhibitor (soybean trypsin inhibitor) on blocking bradykinin synthesis in vitro and its analgesic actions in the rat model were also evaluated. Levels of immunoreactive bradykinin increased threefold to fourfold during oral surgery. Levels were twofold to threefold greater in patients with rheumatoid arthritis compared with control subjects. Levels of immunoreactive bradykinin increased twofold in rats during carrageenan inflammation. Soybean trypsin inhibitor blocked synthesis of bradykinin in vitro and possessed analgesic activity in rats. The results indicate that the bradykinin system is activated during inflammation. Kallikrein inhibitors may represent a new class of analgesic/antiinflammatory drugs.

Underlying cardiac lesions in adults with infective endocarditis. The changing spectrum.

The spectrum of recognized cardiac lesions underlying infective endocarditis has been changing as a result of the decline in incidence of rheumatic heart disease, the recognition of the entity of mitral valve prolapse, and the improvement in cardiac diagnostic techniques. Sixty-three cases of native valve endocarditis diagnosed in Memphis hospitals between 1980 and 1984 were reviewed. All diagnoses of underlying cardiac lesions were confirmed by two-dimensional echocardiography, cardiac catheterization, and/or histopathologic examination of valve tissues. Major categories of underlying lesions were as follows: mitral valve prolapse, 29 percent; no underlying disease, 27 percent; degenerative lesions of the aortic or mitral valve, 21 percent; congenital heart disease, 13 percent; rheumatic heart disease, 6 percent. Thus, mitral valve prolapse and, in the elderly, degenerative lesions have displaced rheumatic and congenital heart diseases as the major conditions underlying endocarditis. Redundancy of the mitral valve leaflets was noted in 17 of 18 patients in whom endocarditis was superimposed upon mitral valve prolapse. The risk of infective endocarditis appears to be substantially increased in the subset of patients with mitral valve prolapse who exhibit valvular redundancy.

The risk of haematogenous infection in total joint replacements.

One thousand patients who received 1112 total joint replacements between 1966 and 1980 were followed up prospectively for an average of six years. These patients were not advised to take antibiotics prophylactically to cover subsequent dental or surgical procedures and, so far, only three cases of haematogenous infection at the site of the joint replacement have developed. Two hundred and twenty-four patients did subsequently undergo dental or surgical procedures and 284 patients developed infections in the respiratory tract, urinary tract or at multiple sites; none of these patients developed haematogenous infection. But of 40 patients who suffered recurrent skin ulceration and infection, three (7.5%) developed haematogenous infection of the replaced joint; two of these belonged to a group of 134 patients with rheumatoid arthritis. These results suggest that transient bacteraemia is not likely to infect a replaced joint in otherwise healthy patients. But an infected skin lesion producing chronic bacteraemia, or septicaemia due to a virulent organism, may well do so and patients with rheumatoid arthritis are at greater risk than those with osteoarthritis.

Bacteremia in pediatric patients following dental manipulations.

A recent study has claimed that children who do not have gingivitis do not have bacteremia following dental manipulations and that these children do not require antibiotic prophylaxis. Postoperative blood cultures from 53 children and adolescents with and without gingivitis drawn within ten minutes of elevation of the gums, extraction of teeth, and extensive gingivectomies were sterile in all cases. The collection and laboratory methods and media were carefully evaluated and found satisfactory. However, the time interval between the dental procedure and the collection of the blood is believed to have been too short for reliable results and that the abandonment of the antibiotic prophylaxis in children is unwarranted.

Postoperative complications in oral surgery. A study of cases treated during 1980.

Postoperative complications associated with 1.457 surgical operations performed during 1980 at the Department of Oral Surgery, Faculty of Odontology, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, are reported. The frequency was found to be 7.4%. With the exception of alveolitis which mostly occurred in older patients, no sex or age differences could be found. The majority of operations were performed in the region of the mandibular third molar and most of the postoperative complications were found to occur here. Of the 102 postoperative complications those most frequently found were alveolitis (41), postoperative infections (31), bleedings (11) and postoperative prolonged anaesthesia (10).