BACKGROUND Standard treatment for pleural infection includes catheter drainage and antibiotics. Tube drainage often fails if the fluid is loculated by fibrinous adhesions when surgical drainage is needed. Streptokinase may aid the process of pleural drainage, but there have been no controlled trials to assess its efficacy. METHODS Twenty four patients with infected community acquired parapneu...

BACKGROUND Standard treatment for pleural infection includes catheter drainage and antibiotics. Tube drainage often fails if the fluid is loculated by fibrinous adhesions when surgical drainage is needed. Streptokinase may aid the process of pleural drainage, but there have been no controlled trials to assess its efficacy. METHODS Twenty four patients with infected community acquired parapneu...

upper quadrant pain and progressive dyspnea for 2 days. He had history of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and chronic kidney disease. On admission, he was febrile and had sinus tachycardia. Laboratory findings showed an elevated white blood cell count of 18.01 × 109/L with 92.1% neutrophils. Liver function tests revealed normal alanine aminotransferase (14 U/L [3–37 U/L]), normal total bi...

BACKGROUND Simple aspiration and drainage is a standard initial treatment for primary spontaneous pneumothorax, but the rate of pneumothorax recurrence is substantial. We investigated whether additional minocycline pleurodesis after simple aspiration and drainage reduces the rate of recurrence. METHODS In our open-label, parallel-group, prospective, randomised, controlled trial at two hospita...

Current treatments for glaucoma are not fully satisfactory. This thesis examines the possibility of improving one of those treatments – the use of a drain in the eye. The goal of the thesis is to increase the likelihood that improved treatments for glaucoma become available at an early date by the use of microsystems engineering. Glaucoma is a serious and common disease of the eye, most often c...

PURPOSE To evaluate the results and long-term complications of glaucoma drainage devices (GDD) in paediatric patients (0-15 years). METHODS Retrospective cohort study was conducted on 17 implanted glaucoma drainage devices from July 1994 to April 2007 in 14 patients (17 eyes). In two patients (3 eyes) a Molteno GDD (MGDD) was implanted, and in 12 patients (14 eyes) an Ahmed GDD (AGDD) was use...

Phosphorus (P) loading from nonpoint sources, such as agricultural landscapes, contributes to downstream aquatic ecosystem degradation. Specifically, within the Mississippi watershed, enriched runoff contributions have far-reaching consequences for coastal water eutrophication and Gulf of Mexico hypoxia. Through storm events, the P mitigation capacity of agricultural drainage ditches under no-t...

BACKGROUND Children with massive ascites can develop abdominal compartment syndrome (ACS), which has been identified as an independent risk factor for mortality. OBJECTIVES The objective of this study was to assess the effectiveness of volume-controlled percutaneous catheter drainage (PCD) for treating children with massive ascites and ACS. METHODS A retrospective descriptive study was cond...

BACKGROUND Conservative surgery (cyst evacuation and partial pericystectomy) for hydatid cysts of the liver is known to be safe but is often associated with bile leak and its sequelae. METHODS Case records of 86 patients undergoing surgery for hydatid cysts of the liver at a tertiary-care center in northern India over a 14-year period were reviewed retrospectively. RESULTS Sixteen (18%) pat...

BACKGROUND Autologous blood transfusion drainage (ABTD) has been used for many years to reduce blood loss in total knee arthroplasty (TKA). We evaluate the current evidence concerning the efficiency and safety of ABTD used in TKA compared with conventional suction drainage (CSD). METHODS We performed a systematic literature search of the PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library and four Chinese datab...