OBJECTIVE To compare the efficacy of conventional Percutaneous Nephrolithotomy (PCNL) with two of its modified procedures. METHODS A randomized controlled trial, was performed on 60 patients undergoing PCNL. Cases of renal stone regardless of stone size and configuration, having pre-operative negative urine culture, no coagulopathy, and no visible residual stone in intra-operative fluoroscopy...

A 70-year-old man with abdominal pain and high fever was referred to our hospital because of suspected branch duct intraductal papillary mucinous neoplasm and pancreatolithiasis. Laboratory results showed a total bilirubin of 4.7mg/dL, slight elevation in the serum pancreatic enzyme level and marked elevation in the serum C-reactive protein level and white blood cell count. Plain computed tomog...

PURPOSE To assess the clinical performance and usefulness of an on-line patient exposure meter installed on a neuroradiologic biplane imaging system. MATERIALS AND METHODS A commercial on-line patient exposure meter was installed on each plane of a biplane neuroradiologic imaging system. The meter computed skin exposures on the basis of selected technique factors (tube potential and current) ...

I define the plain Anabaptists by answering two essential questions: “Who are the plain Anabaptists” and “What are the plain Anabaptists?” In asking “Who are the plain Anabaptists?” I investigate several dimensions of identity. First, I trace the history of seven religious traditions within Anabaptism: the Swiss Brethren/Mennonites, the Low German/Russian Mennonites, the Hutterites, the Amish, ...

heavy metals due to their non biodegradability properties and can accumulate in living tissues, thus becoming concentrated throughout the food chain and can be readily absorbed into the human body. among them manganese was examined in this study as a pollutant. the aim of this study is the manganese removal from aqueous solution using a windy sand fixed bed column of sistan plain. flow rate, in...

A 77-year-old man presented with acute breathlessness. He had a history of smoking 20 cigarettes per day for 45 years, but stopped smoking at the age of 74. He had pneumothorax of the right three times, which was treated surgically two times. On arrival, he was clear and ambulatory. The vital signs were stable: blood pressure was 130/80 mmHg, pulse rate 84 beats per minute, respiratory rate 16 ...

The heat transfer characteristics of the working fluid passing through absorber a solar parabolic trough collector (SPTC) can be enhanced by creation turbulence effect. Therefore, novel idea was implemented introducing corrugated tube (CT) instead plain in collector. enhancement improved further use conical strip inserts inside SPTC. A receiver with pitch 8 mm and corrugation height 2 used thre...

Recently, permeable geotextile tubes in conjunction with prefabricated horizontal drains (PHDs) have become increasingly popular for dewatering high water content slurries or sludge. However, how to analyze the consolidation process of sludge tube so as provide a proper design and prediction becomes technical challenge. In this paper, we proposed two-dimensional plain-strain model under combine...

To the Editor: Inert thixotropic gel is commonly used in blood collection tubes for separation of serum or plasma from the cellular components of blood. Eichhorn et al. (1 ) in 1997 suggested that gel tubes (Sarstedt) used in their laboratory were generally reliable, but they found incomplete separation in 3.1% of tubes. Plain tubes are preferred for therapeutic drug monitoring because of the p...