The burden of moderate/severe premenstrual syndrome and premenstrual dysphoric disorder in a cohort of Latin American women.

OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between symptom severity, cost, and impairment in women with moderate/severe premenstrual syndrome (PMS) or premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) in a Latin American setting. METHODS: A model was constructed based on analysis of an observational dataset. Data were included from four Latin American countries. Responder-level data were analysed according to four categories of symptom severity: Category 1 comprised Daily Record of Severity of Problems score 21 to 41.9, Category 2 score was 42 to 62.9, Category 3 score was 63 to 83.9, and Category 4 was a score of 84 or higher. Burden was estimated in terms of impact on job and activities using the modified work productivity and impairment questionnaire and affect on quality of life using the SF-12 questionnaire. Costs were estimated in Brazilian reals from a Brazilian private health care and societal perspective. The outputs of the analysis were estimates of burden, mean annual cost and affect on quality of life (as measured by quality adjusted life years) by symptom severity. Confidence intervals around key outcomes were generated through nonparametric bootstrapping. RESULTS: Analysis suggests a significant cost burden associated with moderate/severe PMS and PMDD with mean per patient annual costs estimated at 1618 BRL (95% confidence interval 957-2,481). Although the relationship between cost, quality of life, and severity was not clear, analysis showed a consistent relationship between disease severity and measures of disease burden (job and daily activity). Burden on activities increased with disease severity. CONCLUSIONS: Our analysis, conducted from a Latin American perspective, suggests a significant burden and an increasing impairment associated with moderate/severe PMS and PMDD.

Economic evaluation of clodronate and zoledronate in patients diagnosed with metastatic bone disease from the perspective of public and third party payors in Brazil.

BACKGROUND: Metastatic bone disease (MBD) is responsible for >99% of malignant tumors that affect the bone. MBD patients have increased risk of skeletal complications that are often dramatic and result in loss of function or disability, leading to rapid deterioration of quality of life. Bisphosphonates have become the standard therapy for the treatment and prevention of skeletal-related events (SREs). OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of zoledronate and clodronate in the prevention of SREs in patients with MBD. METHODS: A pharmacoeconomic analysis was performed for a hypothetical cohort of patients with MBD to compare the costs and consequences of the use of clodronate and zoledronate for treatment and prevention of SREs in MBD in Brazil. The model was constructed using decision analysis techniques. Costs were described in 5 categories-drugs, physician visits, hospitalizations, surgical/medical care, and laboratory tests-and were reported in 2008 Brazilian reais (1 BRL = 0.54 US dollar). Quality-adjusted life years gained was considered as an outcome. Sensitivity analyses tested model robustness. RESULTS: The total cost of treatment of MBD in Brazil for a 5-year time-horizon was R$46,313 with clodronate and R$50,319 with zoledronate. The estimated number of quality-adjusted life years was 2.00 and 1.90 for clodronate and zoledronate, respectively. Cost-effectiveness ranking was unchanged when model time-horizon was changed to 1 or 10 years. Univariate analysis revealed the incidence of osteonecrosis as a sensitive parameter in the model. Multivariate analysis confirmed base-case results, in which >60% of model iterations favored clodronate over zoledronate. CONCLUSION: The present pharmacoeconomic evaluation, under the premises presented, found that clodronate was dominant over zoledronate from both the public and the private health care perspectives in Brazil.

Tratamento cirúrgico das complicações da anastomose esôfago-visceral cervical / Surgical treatment of the complications of the cervical esophago visceral anastomosis

A anastomose esôfago-visceral cervical apresenta como complicações a fístula e a estenose, que podem necessitar de reintervenção cirúrgica para sua correção. Com o objetivo de avaliar as táticas para abordagem operatória dessas complicações e seus resultados, os autores estudaram retrospectivamente nove pacientes, que demandaram esta conduta, num período de 17 anos. Foram operadas duas fístulas e sete estenoses da anastomose esôfago-visceral cervical, sendo a via de acesso inicial a cervicotomia em todos ospacientes. Em quatro casos, houve necessidade de ampliação para esternotomia mediana total, que facilitousignificativamente a reconstrução, porém com mortalidade de 75%. As táticas adotadas foram a reanastomoseem cinco casos, a sutura do orifício da fístula em um caso e a plastia em três casos. A ressutura teve mau resultado. As plastias evoluíram satisfatoriamente, e os doentes submetidos a reanastomose sem ésternotomiatambém evoluíram satisfatoriamente. A plastia da anastomose demonstrou ser uma boa tática para o tratamento da estenose cervical, enquanto a reanastomose parece ter a melhor indicação nas fístulas, devendo-se evitar a esternotomia total mediana.

The esophago-visceral cervical anastomosis presents complications such as fistula and stenosis that mayneed surgical reintervention for it’s correction. The authors, with the objective of evaluating proceduresfor surgical approach and the results of these complications, have studied retrospectively 9 patients whom demanded this conduct in a 17-year period. Two fistulas and seven esophago-visceral cervical anastomosisstenosis were performed, being cervicotomy the initial access in all patients. In four cases there was a needto enlarge the access, achieved with a total median sternotomy, which made the reconstruction significantly easier, therefore there was 75% mortality. The tactics adopted were reanastomosis in 5 cases, suture of the fistula’s orifice in one case, and plasty in three. Ressuturing obtained bad results. The patients subbmited to plasties evoluted satisfactorily and patients submitted to reanastomosis without total median sternotomy also evoluted satisfactorily. Anastomosis plasty proved to be a good tactic for the treatment of cervicalstenosis, while reanastomosis seems to be a better indication for treatment of fistulas, being that total median sternotomy is avoided.

Clinical and laboratorial correlation of postoperative hypocalcemia after extensive thyroidectomy

The medical records of 84 patients submitted to extensive thyroidectomy from January 1991 to April 1995 were reviewed and the data there was analyzed in order to verified a correlation between postoperative laboratories results and physical findings suggestive of hypocalcemia. It was verifed that was hypocalcemia in 51.2 percent of the patients, of which only 18.6 percent presented symptoms. It was concluded that asymptomatic hypocalcemia is frequent in extensive thyroidectomy and a routine screening for serum calcium in the postoperative period following thyroidectomy and calcium reposition must be systematic.