Patent ductus arteriosus remains a frequent problem in premature infants with the respiratory distress syndrome.¹–³ In a large network of neonatal intensive care units, the frequency of patent ductus arteriosus in infants weighing 501 to 1500 g was 31 ...

In premenopausal women, the rate of production of testosterone is about 300 μg (1040 nmol) per day,¹ of which about half is derived from the ovaries and half from the adrenal glands.² In women who undergo bilateral oophorectomy before natural menopause, ...

Acute asthma is the most common medical emergency in children. Adequate oxygenation, frequent use of aerosolized β₂-adrenergic agonists, and anticholinergic drugs and systemic corticosteroids are the mainstay of therapy for severe disease.¹–³ Systemic ...

Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a well-known cause of nosocomial infections among infants in neonatal intensive care units. The clinical syndromes that have been described in affected infants include conjunctivitis and endophthalmitis, skin infections, ...

Figure 1. A 42-year-old man with a history of non-insulin-dependent diabetes presented with acute right-flank pain. He was afebrile, and an examination revealed tenderness of the right upper quadrant. The white-cell count was 17,700 per cubic millimeter, ...

A man dies because his body has rejected a heart transplant; a woman is crippled by rheumatoid arthritis; a child goes into a coma that is brought on by cerebral malaria; another child dies of an infection because of an immunodeficiency; an elderly man ...

Ischemic stroke exacts a heavy toll in death and disability worldwide. In the United States, where it is the third leading cause of death and the leading cause of serious long-term disability, approximately 750,000 strokes occur annually, with an annual ...

Stage

An 80-year-old man with degenerative arthritis of the hip and spine began to have midthoracic back pain and worsening pain in his left hip. The pain began suddenly, was not preceded by trauma, did not radiate, and was not relieved in any position. ...

The ductus arteriosus connects the pulmonary artery to the descending aorta. During fetal life it diverts most of the combined ventricular output away from the lungs toward the placenta. In full-term newborns, the ductus closes within 24 to 48 hours after ...

In this issue of the Journal, Shifren and coworkers¹ postulate that the reduction in androgens resulting from bilateral oophorectomy is associated with sexual dysfunction in some women and that testosterone replacement can reverse this decline in sexual ...

Approaches involving the blockade of inflammatory cytokines such as interleukin-1 and tumor necrosis factor α (TNF-α) are entering mainstream clinical medicine: antibodies against TNF-α and soluble receptors for TNF-α are being used to treat rheumatoid ...

To the Editor: I am concerned that the report by Schatzkin and colleagues (April 20 issue)¹ may lead many people to conclude erroneously that diet does not affect susceptibility to colon cancer, even though the hypothesis was not adequately tested. ...

To the Editor: Two echinococcus species — Echinococcus multilocularis and E. granulosus — are known to exist in central Europe and to cause alveolar and cystic echinococcosis, respectively, in humans. We report a high prevalence of antibodies against ...

To the Editor: Rothman (April 27 issue)¹ contends that medical professionalism is losing the battle against capitalism. My colleagues and I at the American Academy of Ophthalmology agree that medicine should be practiced in the best interest of the ...

To the Editor: Capecitabine (Xeloda, Roche Laboratories) is an orally administered fluoropyrimidine carbamate used for the treatment of metastatic breast cancer and colon cancer.¹–⁴ We describe two patients in whom marked ocular irritation, decreased ...

To the Editor: In their article on Eugene O'Neill (April 13 issue),¹ Price and Richardson incorrectly claim that “existing biographies of O'Neill have displayed considerable uncertainty about the details” of the “ultimately lethal neurodegenerative ...

To the Editor: There are few reports describing nonpenetrating cardiac injuries other than those caused by automobile and motorcycle accidents.¹ We describe a patient who had an isolated coronary arterial laceration as the result of a fall.

A 59-year-old ...

Munchausen syndrome by proxy (a parent inducing illness in a child) is an uncommon condition that commonly causes diagnostic difficulty and misunderstanding of its true nature. The perpetrators are notoriously difficult to work with, and many ...

It is quite fitting that as board certification in pediatric dermatology finally becomes a reality, the first major textbook in this subspecialty with the gravitas to stand up to its “adult” counterparts has been published. The Textbook of Pediatric ...

Atopic dermatitis is a common skin disease and is especially prevalent in children. This book looks at the epidemiology of atopic dermatitis and examines, in the editor's words, “the causes and distribution of this common yet enigmatic disease.” The ...