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Optimal blood pressure typically is defined as 120 mm Hg systolic — which is the pressure as your heart beats — over 80 mm Hg diastolic — which is the pressure as your heart relaxes. For your resting heart rate, the target is between 60 and 100 beats per minute (bpm)
Ventricular fibrillation is a heart rhythm problem that occurs when the heart beats with rapid, erratic electrical impulses. This causes pumping chambers in your heart (the ventricles) to quiver uselessly, instead of pumping blood. Sometimes triggered by a heart attack, ventricular fibrillation causes your blood pressure to plummet, cutting off blood supply to your vital organs. Ventricular fibrillation, an emergency that requires immediate medical attention, causes the person to collapse within seconds. It's the most frequent cause of sudden cardiac death. Emergency treatment includes cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and shocks to the heart with a device called a defibrillator. Treatments for those at risk of ventricular fibrillation include medications and implantable devices that can restore a normal heart rhythm.
The "great arteries" in this anomaly refer to the aorta and the pulmonary artery, the two major arteries carrying blood away from the heart. In cases of transposition of the great arteries, these vessels arise from the wrong ventricle. They are "transposed" from their normal position so that the aorta arises from the right ventricle and the pulmonary artery from the left ventricle. Other heart defects may occur along with transposition of the great arteries. About 25 percent of children with transposition will also have a ventricular septal defect (VSD) . In nearly a third, the branching pattern of the coronary arteries as they leave the transposed aorta is unusual. Infants may also have narrowing below the pulmonary valve that blocks blood flow from the left ventricle to the lungs.
A parasitic twin (also known as an asymmetrical or unequal conjoined twin) is the result of the processes that produce vanishing twins and conjoined twins, and may represent a continuum between the two. Parasitic twins occur when a twin embryo begins developing in utero, but the pair does not fully separate, and one embryo maintains dominant development at the expense of the other. Unlike conjoined twins, one ceases development during gestation and is vestigial to a mostly fully-formed, otherwise healthy individual twin. The undeveloped twin is defined as parasitic, rather than conjoined, because it is incompletely formed or wholly dependent on the body functions of the complete fetus. The independent twin is called the autosite.
Most retinal tears need to be treated by sealing the retina to the back wall of the eye with laser surgery or cryotherapy (a freezing treatment). Both of these procedures create a scar that helps seal the retina to the back of the eye. This prevents fluid from traveling through the tear and under the retina, which usually prevents the retina from detaching. These treatments cause little or no discomfort and may be performed in your ophthalmologist’s office. With laser surgery, your ophthalmologist uses a laser to make small burns around the retinal tear. The scarring that results seals the retina to the underlying tissue, helping to prevent a retinal detachment.
Current treatment is a combination of pegylated interferon-alpha-2a or pegylated interferon-alpha-2b (brand names Pegasys or PEG-Intron) and the antiviral drug ribavirin for a period of 24 or 48 weeks, depending on hepatitis C virus genotype. In a large multicenter randomized control study among genotype 2 or 3 infected patients (NORDymanIC),[35] patients achieving HCV RNA below 1000 IU/mL by day 7 who were treated for 12 weeks demonstrated similar cure rates as those treated for 24 weeks.[36][37]
Pegylated interferon-alpha-2a plus ribavirin may increase sustained virological response among patients with chronic hepatitis C as compared to pegylated interferon-alpha-2b plus ribavirin according to a systematic review of randomized controlled trials .[38] The relative benefit increase was 14.6%. For patients at similar risk to those in this study (41.0% had sustained virological response when not treated with pegylated interferon alpha 2a plus ribavirin), this leads to an absolute benefit increase of 6%. About 16.7 patients must be treated for one to benefit (number needed to treat = 16.7; click here [39] to adjust these results for patients at higher or lower risk of sustained virological response). However, this study's results may be biased due to uncertain temporality of association, selective dose response.
Treatment is generally recommended for patients with proven hepatitis C virus infection and persistently abnormal liver function tests.
Treatment during the acute infection phase has much higher success rates (greater than 90%) with a shorter duration of treatment; however, this must be balanced against the 15-40% chance of spontaneous clearance without treatment (see Acute Hepatitis C section above).
Those with low initial viral loads respond much better to treatment than those with higher viral loads (greater than 400,000 IU/mL). Current combination therapy is usually supervised by physicians in the fields of gastroenterology, hepatology or infectious disease.
The treatment may be physically demanding, particularly for those with a prior history of drug or alcohol abuse. It can qualify for temporary disability in some cases. A substantial proportion of patients will experience a panoply of side effects ranging from a 'flu-like' syndrome (the most common, experienced for a few days after the weekly injection of interferon) to severe adverse events including anemia, cardiovascular events and psychiatric problems such as suicide or suicidal ideation. The latter are exacerbated by the general physiological stress experienced by the patient.
Acute kidney failure — also called acute renal failure or acute kidney injury — develops rapidly over a few hours or a few days. Acute kidney failure is most common in people who are already hospitalized, particularly in critically ill people who need intensive care. Acute kidney failure can be fatal and requires intensive treatment. However, acute kidney failure may be reversible. If you're otherwise in good health, you may recover normal or nearly normal kidney function
Acute intermittent porphyria (AIP) is a rare autosomal dominant metabolic disorder affecting the production of heme, the oxygen-binding prosthetic group of hemoglobin. It is characterized by a deficiency of the enzyme porphobilinogen deaminase.