PURPOSE The purpose of this study was to illuminate the meanings of support as disclosed by mothers of children with congenital heart defects (CHD). DESIGN AND METHOD Narrative interviews were conducted with 10 mothers of children with CHD. A phenomenological-hermeneutic method was used for interpretation of the transcribed interviews. RESULTS The comprehensive understanding of mothers' liv...

Mariana López, 18, is 6 months pregnant with her first child. A routine screening ultrasound at 20 weeks demonstrated a constellation of severe fetal defects, including a structural brain anomaly, multiple heart defects, and an abdominal wall defect. Concerned about a possible genetic syndrome, Ms López’s obstetrician, Dr Sarah Wilson, scheduled an amniocentesis, which confirmed trisomy 13 (Pat...

Lichen planus (LP) is a chronic inflammatory mucocutaneous disorder with unknown etiology. Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is known as a prototypic autoimmune disease. Cytokines play a key role in the pathogenesis of both diseases. Various cytokines, such as interleukin 6 (IL-6), interleukin 10 (IL-10), interferon alpha (INF-a), and Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha (TNF-a) can serve as biomarkers...

The current review examines the relationship between depression and the inflammatory immune response. Mood disorders are a significant cause of morbidity and the etiology of depression is still not clearly understood. Many studies have shown links between inflammatory cytokines and mood disorders, including elevated level of cytokines like tumour necrosis factor-alpha (TNF alpha), Interleukins ...

Objectives: Detachment of the septal lea ̄et of the tricuspid valve from the annulus (TVD) has been used to improve visualization of ventricular septal defects (VSDs), but may be associated with increased operative time, heart block, and the development of tricuspid regurgitation (TR). Methods: Patients undergoing VSD closure between 1/1/96 and 31/12/99 were retrospectively reviewed. Follow-up w...

The progress of surgery on congenital heart defects in the past 20 years has been impressive. A variety of conditions can now be successfully rectified. For some, surgery can be initiated at an earlier age, benefiting the health and development of the young child and reducing the mortality and morbidity. This is so for children with Fallot's tetralogy, who have had increasingly early palliative...

OBJECTIVE To assess the level of partner relationship satisfaction among mothers of children with different severity of congenital heart defects (CHD) compared with mothers in the cohort. METHODS Mothers of children with mild, moderate, or severe CHD (n = 182) and a cohort of mothers of children without CHD (n = 46,782) from the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study were assessed at 5 time ...

A number of diseases affecting the heart are prevalent in canines. Acquired diseases, those which develop over the course of an animal's lifetime (rather than congenital defects present at birth), have recently been the subject of several studies to determine the efficacy of dietary supplementation on symptom presentation, disease severity, and mortality rates. Specifically, coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10...

holt-oram syndrome (hos) is a developmental disorder inherited in an autosomal-dominant pattern. affected organs are the heart and forelimbs with upper extremity skeletal defects and congenital heart malformation. in this study we present three cases of hos in the same family. in one of these three individuals we detected a transition of c to t (ctg-gtt, v205v) in exon 7 of the tbx5 gene. this ...

The presence of various cytokines, namely the tumor necrosis factor (TNF-alpha), interferon (IFN-gamma), and interleukins (IL-1 beta and IL-6), was investigated in seminal plasma of fertile, infertile, and immunoinfertile men using specific immunoradiometric assays. TNF-alpha and IL-1 beta were not detected. IFN-gamma was detected, but the differences between the levels of fertile and infertile...