A 59-year-old male with alcoholic cirrhosis presented to our hospital with an acutely painful umbilical hernia, and 4 mo of exertional dyspnea. He was noted to be tachypneic and hypoxic. He had a massive right sided pleural effusion with leftward mediastinal shift and gross ascites, with a tense, fluid-filled, umbilical hernia. Emergent paracentesis with drain placement and a large volume thora...

Dr. Saul Jarcho's several papers on the history of hydrothorax, culminating in the present translation of an authoritative eighteenth-entury 'review article', effectively dispel the idea obtainable from some modem reference works that the history of hydrothorax begins with the introduction of auscultation and percussion. Practical Observations on Dropsy of the Chest was published in Breslau in ...

Unlike trace pericardial fluid, which can be seen in normal fetuses, any fluid in the pleural space is abnormal.1,2 The incidence of fetal pleural effusion is unknown, but has been estimated to occur in 1 in 15,000 pregnancies in tertiary care centers.2,3,29 The actual incidence of primary fetal hydrothorax may be even higher if one considers that in many cases the condition may remain undiagno...

PURPOSE We aimed to assess the safety, efficacy, and clinical outcomes of splenic artery embolization (SAE). MATERIALS AND METHODS A total of 50 patients (male:female, 33:17; mean age, 49 years) who underwent 50 SAEs between 1998 and 2011 were retrospectively studied. The procedure indications included aneurysm or pseudoaneurysm (n=15), gastric variceal hemorrhage (n=15), preoperative reducti...

BACKGROUND Thoracic complications of ventriculoperitoneal (VP) shunts have been extensively reported in the literature. Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) hydrothorax without catheter migration, however, has been rarely described and poorly understood. CASE DESCRIPTION We describe development of pleural effusion and respiratory distress in a 3-year-old boy with no evidence of VP shunt catheter displac...

Thiazolidinediones represent an established class of insulin sensitizing agents for treating noninsulin-dependent diabetes mellitus. Darglitazone, a thiazolidinedione approximately 200x more potent than ciglitazone, was evaluated in preclinical safety assessment studies using rats (1, 5, and 50 mg/kg/day) and cynomolgus monkeys (50, 75, and 100 mg/kg/day). Darglitazone was a potent adipogenic a...

This review considers the modern concepts of pathogenesis, diagnostic methods, and treatment principles of hepatic hydrothorax (HH). HH is the excessive (> 500 mL) accumulation of transudate in the pleural cavity in patients with decompensated liver cirrhosis but without cardiopulmonary and pleural diseases. It causes respiratory failure which aggravates the clinical course of liver cirrhosis, ...