We herein report the case of a 72-year-old man demonstrating myasthenia gravis (MG) with a dropped head and acute respiratory insufficiency. There was no ocular, bulbar, or limb involvement. The patient was seronegative for anti-acetylcholine receptor (AChR) antibodies and anti-muscle-specific tyrosine kinase (MuSK) antibodies. Subsequent tests showed seropositivity for anti-low-density lipopro...

OBJECTIVE We performed a longitudinal study to elucidate the correlation between respiratory insufficiency and respiratory biomarkers, including diaphragmatic compound muscle action potential (DCMAP), at the initiation of noninvasive ventilation (NIV) in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). METHODS The patients were assessed at least every six months. Additional assessments were...

A 72-year-old man who had been diagnosed with type B influenza infection and high fever 4 days previously was admitted to our hospital. He presented with severe respiratory insufficiency; chest computed tomography (CT) revealed extensive ground-glass opacity in lung fields on both sides. Although peramivir and antibiotics were administered, reticular shadows on chest CT worsened and respiratory...

Malnutrition in patients with severe respiratory insufficiency can lead to severe complications, justifying the use of objective nutritional assessment techniques, such as bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA), which is an easy, noninvasive method of measuring body composition. The purpose of this study was to develop, and validate against dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA), a BIA formula ...

AIM Due to the common etiologic factor, a considerable number of esophagogastric cancer patients suffer from respiratory insufficiency in course of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, primary to cancer. Systemic hypoxemia may account for poor oxygenation of tumor tissue-a main driving force of tumor neoangiogenesis. We hypothesized that in cancer patients with respiratory insufficiency, syst...