Iranian South Medical Journal
Year:2023 | Volume:26 | Issue:2|Papers Count:5

2Background: Gentamicin (GM) induced nephrotoxicity is one of the most common causes of acute kidney injury and limits its administration. Evidence suggests that pre-treatment with oxygen increases the activity of antioxidant enzymes and protects tissues against different kinds of damage. In this study, the effect of daily normobaric heperoxia pre-treatment on alleviating gentamicin induced nephrotoxicity was investigated. Materials and Methods: Twenty-eight male Wistar rats were randomly divided into four groups (n=7): Control (room air); Gentamicin (100 mg/kg, IP, for 9 days); Hyperoxia60 (60 min daily pretreatment with 95% oxygen and then 100 mg/kg gentamicin, IP, for 9 days) and Hyperoxia180 (180 min daily pretreatment with 95% oxygen and then 100 mg/kg gentamicin, IP, for 9 days). Then 24 h urine was collected and on day 10, the rats were sacrificed for serum, urine and renal tissue sampling. Results: Results showed that hyperoxia significantly enhanced renal antioxidative capacity and decreased serum creatinine and renal failure index. Histological examination and SPECT scan also showed that tissue damage in the hyperoxia groups was lower compared to the gentamicin group. However, hyperoxia effect on body weight, kidney-to-body weight ratio, urine volume, blood urea nitrogen and glomerular filtration was not significant. Conclusion: Although pre-treatment with hyperoxia enhances the antioxidant capacity of renal tissue and improves some of the functional and histopathological parameters of the kidney, it failed to completely restore the adverse effects of gentamicin-induced nephrotoxicity. Thus, more studies are needed to determine the clinical effect of hyperoxia on gentamicin-induced nephrotoxicity.

2Background: Angiogenesis is seen in active pulmonary tuberculosis. One of the factors involved in angiogenesis is vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF). Therefore, the aim of this case-control study is to investigate and compare the level of VEGF as a possible factor involved in angiogenesis in active pulmonary tuberculosis Materials and Methods: The present case-control study enrolled 90 patients hospitalized in Boo-ali Hospital in Zahedan (45 patients with active pulmonary tuberculosis and 45 non-tuberculosis patients). In this study, census sampling method was used and VEGF level was measured by ELISA method. Data was analyzed in SPSS22 at a significance level of 0.05. Results: The mean age was 43.29±18.6 years in the case group and 37.93±16.2 years in the control group, and the majority of patients in both groups were women. The serum level of vascular endothelial growth factor was increased in patients with pulmonary tuberculosis (334.36±90.6) compared to the control group (192.96±48.8). There was a significant difference in the serum level of vascular endothelial growth factor in patients with active pulmonary tuberculosis compared to the control group (P<0.05). There was no significant relationship between smoking or gender and VEGF serum level. Conclusion: Considering that the serum level of vascular endothelial growth factor in patients with active pulmonary tuberculosis increased significantly compared to the control group, this increase can indicate active pulmonary tuberculosis.

2Background: Helicobacter pylori found in the gastric mucosa of more than 50% of the human popula-tion, and the risk of stomach cancer increases in infected individuals. Materials and Methods: In this retrospective study, the target population was patients admitted to Namazi Hospital in Shiraz during 2009-2018. For this purpose, 3099 records of patients were analyzed with regard to history of endoscopy, age, gender, chief complaint, reason for referral, initial clinical diag-nosis, pathology result, and presence of Helicobacter pylori.   Results: Among all the examined individuals, 776 (69. 1%) of women and 1197 (60. 9%) of men were in-fected with Helicobacter pylori. The most and the least affected individuals fell in the age group 59-36 years with 899 (0. 29%) and 19-35 years with 573 (18. 5%), respectively. Of the participants, 1380 (69. 9%) had a history of endoscopy. The most common causes for patient's chief complaint or the reason for go-ing to the hospital or referring for hospitalization were burping (11. 1%), vomiting (9. 8%), hematemesis (9. 8%), heartburn (9. 7%) and dysphagia (9. 6%). In terms of the initial clinical diagnosis, the most causes pertained to chronic gastritis (21. 6%), atrophic gastritis (18. 7%), gastric ulcer (16. 8%) and intractable vomiting (14. 0%). Conclusion: The results of this study showed that the prevalence of Helicobacter pylori has decreased in recent years and that being infected is related to gender and age.

2Background: The hospital autonomy plan, the biggest decentralization plan to reform the administration structure of public hospitals, has been implemented for about three decades in Iran. In this study, we aimed to examine the effects of the plan on the financial indicators of autonomous public hospitals. Materials and Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional study used revenue and cost data associated with all public hospitals affiliated to Bushehr University of Medical Sciences in 2021. The relevant data was extracted from two big databases including health information system (HIS) and accounting system, and after the data quality control, specific financial self-sufficiency balance (the ratio of specific income to the specific cost of the same hospital) and total financial balance (the ratio of specific income to the total cost of the same hospital) were calculated using Excel software. Results: Results demonstrated that the specific financial self-sufficiency balance and the total financial balance were 61% and 27%, respectively. The highest and the lowest values of the specific financial self- sufficiency index pertained to the Heart Hospital (the only single specialty heart hospital in the province) and Imam Hossein Hospital (a hospital with 29 active beds in Tangestan county with a population of 82502) as 74% and 45%, respectively. The gap index between the specific cost and revenue of each ac-tive bed showed that on average, the cost of each bed was nearly 215 million Tomans higher than its own income in 2021. Conclusion: The hospital autonomy plan had different effects on the financial indices of public hospitals studied in this research, denoting it is not possible to cover all hospital-specific expenses through its own earned revenues. Accordingly, government subsidies to autonomous hospitals are necessary.

2Splenic abscess is a rare disease with growing incidence due to the increasing number of immunocompro-mised patients and usage of improved diagnostic imaging modalities. Hematogenous infections are the most common cause of splenic abscess. Because of nonspecific clinical presentation, diagnosis might be de-layed. CT-scan is the imaging method of choice for diagnosis. Ttreatment includes antibiotics alone or antibiotic therapy with percutaneous drainage or splenectomy. In this article, we present a rare case of multiple splenic abscess (MSA) in a patient undergoing hemodialysis in Bushehr.