Ibutilide is a class III antiarrhythmic agent that is used for the conversion of atrial fibrillation to sinus rhythm.¹–⁶ Ibutilide lowers the energy requirement for ventricular defibrillation, but its effect on the energy required for atrial ...

Although implantable cardioverter–defibrillators are effective in terminating ventricular tachyarrhythmias and preventing sudden death from cardiac causes, patients with defibrillators often receive adjunctive antiarrhythmic-drug therapy to reduce the ...

Human herpesvirus 8 (HHV-8, also known as Kaposi's sarcoma–associated herpesvirus) has been consistently linked to Kaposi's sarcoma.¹–³ HHV-8 is detectable in the lesions of nearly all patients with Kaposi's sarcoma,⁴,⁵ and its presence in the blood ...

Von Hippel–Lindau disease and multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2 (MEN-2) are multisystem neoplastic disorders, inherited in an autosomal dominant fashion, that account for most currently identified familial pheochromocytomas.¹ In patients with von Hippel–...

Figure 1. Evaluation of a 35-year-old man with recent headache and unsteadiness and a history of blindness of the left eye for two years revealed normal blood pressure and renal function, a hemoglobin concentration of 18.2 g per deciliter, and a ...

The research programs of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have been remarkably successful over the past 50 years. NIH-funded scientists have made substantial progress in understanding the basic mechanisms of disease and have vastly improved the ...

One hundred years have passed since Felix Hoffman, working at Bayer Industries, reported the successful synthesis of acetylsalicylic acid as the first nonsteroidal antiinflammatory drug (NSAID).¹,² At the suggestion of Hermann Dreser, Bayer's chief ...

Presentation of Case

A 54-year-old woman was admitted to the hospital because of acute renal failure and thrombocytopenia.

The patient had been in excellent health until five and a half weeks earlier, when she began to have respiratory symptoms with fever ...

The growing recognition of the potentially harmful effects of antiarrhythmic drugs¹ and the subsequent proof from controlled trials that some of these drugs can increase the risk of death in some patients have led to a decline in their use.²,³ This change ...

The discovery of the relation between Kaposi's sarcoma and human herpesvirus 8 (HHV-8, or Kaposi's sarcoma–associated herpesvirus) is a superb example of the benefits gained from the synergy between epidemiologic and laboratory science. A series of ...

The appropriations process has been kind to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) during the past few years, for several reasons. The public and its representatives in government applaud our goal of making discoveries that ameliorate or eliminate ...

Now that we as a nation have put the impeachment spectacle behind us, we have the opportunity to address issues that will truly affect our well-being during the early decades of the next century. The future of our health care system is certainly one of ...

To the Editor: The Health Policy Report entitled “The Exportation of Managed Care to Latin America” (April 8 issue)¹ contains numerous grossly inaccurate references to the Principal Financial Group and its Latin American operations, which are damaging to ...

To the Editor: We reported previously on mother-to-child transmission of human herpesvirus 8 (HHV-8) in South Africa.¹ Stored serum samples obtained from 107 women (60 were black, 24 white, 5 Asian, and 18 other) and 112 of their children between the ...

To the Editor: Castleman and coworkers first described a lymphatic hyperplasia now called Castleman's disease, which has two forms, the hyaline vascular type (found in 90 percent of cases) and the plasma-cell type (found in 10 percent).¹,² Patients may ...

To the Editor: The fundamental flaw in the article by Fuchs et al. (Jan. 21 issue)¹ concerns the definition of what constitutes a high-fiber diet. I was lucky enough to attend one of Dr. Denis Burkitt's lectures in London in 1972 and vividly remember how ...

To the Editor: The study by Navari et al. (Jan. 21 issue)¹ of the ability of a new, selective neurokinin-1–receptor antagonist, L-754,030, to prevent cisplatin-induced acute and delayed emesis has two important shortcomings. First, the ability of L-754,...

To the Editor: Several observations argue against Ross's hypothesis (Jan. 14 issue)¹ that atherosclerosis is an inflammatory disease. Oxidized low-density lipoprotein (LDL) is widely distributed in the fetal aorta,² but atherosclerotic plaques are not ...

To the Editor: In describing the image of the Babinski sign in an infant, Neelon and Harvey (Jan. 21 issue)¹ state that the “reflex is present in normal newborn infants and disappears as the central nervous system matures.” Although this statement has ...

To the Editor: Even after suffering potentially fatal injuries, venomous snakes are capable of injuring humans. Klauber performed experiments showing that rattlesnake heads are dangerous for 20 to 60 minutes after decapitation.¹ We prospectively ...

How could the Holocaust have occurred? How could the seemingly sophisticated German society of the Weimar Republic permit the rise of the National Socialist Party? How could the new Nazi government nearly destroy the country's medical system in the name ...

Written by an internationally recognized authority on the management of subarachnoid hemorrhage, this monograph has a well-crafted text complemented by figures and tables of high quality. The book's 12 chapters are divided into three sections. The first ...

Up to 5 percent of the general population will have seizures during their lifetimes, and in half of those epilepsy will develop. About 1 of every 200 people has medically uncontrolled epilepsy.

Epilepsy substantially disrupts the lives of those it affects,...