Active clinical trials for "Heart and Blood Diseases"

Tripping over obstacles is one of the common movements in daily life and is the most frequently mentioned cause of falls in the elderly. Indeed, crossing obstacles is a more complex motor skill than walking, and ensuring sufficient clearance of an obstacle during locomotion requires accurate movement and appropriate modifications of the swing limb. However, little is known about the obstacle crossing deficits that following stroke, especially in good outcome and function independently strokes. It is still a mystery about motor control and motor plastic of central nerve system. The purpose of the study was to observe and quantify certain characteristics of the performance of subjects following stroke with good outcome to understand the damage of central nerve system how to affect motor control. The present study investigated selected spatial-temporal characteristics, kinematic variables and kinetic variables of the gait pattern to define further the problems in obstacle crossing following strokes. To quantify the deficits, we compared results from a group of subjects with stroke with a group of healthy subjects matched for age, gender, and height.

The major risk factors of aortic valve replacement in three outlet types VSD after surgical repair were the severity of preoperative AR and older operation age. For those patients with less than moderate degree AR preoperatively, AR progressed rarely and all in those with aortic valvar and subvalvar anomalies.

Atherosclerosis is unquestionably the leading cause of morbidity and mortality in developed countries, and the world-wide importance of acute vascular syndromes is increasing. Rupture of atherosclerotic plaque has been identified as the proximate event in the majority of cases of acute ischemic syndromes. Therefore, modalities capable of characterizing the atherosclerotic lesion may be helpful in understanding its natural history and detecting lesions with high risk for acute events. Optical coherence tomography (OCT) is a powerful tool capable of tomographic imaging based on low coherence interferometry. It is analogous to ultrasound imaging except that it uses infrared light instead of sound. Polarization-sensitive optical coherence tomography (PS-OCT) combines the advantages of OCT with additional image contrast of the sample. The added contrast is based on the ability of PS-OCT to detect the birefringent properties of a sample (phase retardation and fast-axis orientation) simultaneously. The goals of this project are: 1) to examine whether PS-OCT is an acceptable tool for the characterization of typical plaque constituents; and 2) to explain the correlation between birefringence and forming or rupture of a plaque; and 3) to establish a quantitative PS-OCT image criteria for atherosclerotic plaque characterization in vitro.

The purpose of the study is to test accuracy of positive preejection velocity to predict left ventricular remodeling and long-term prognosis after revascularization in 200 patients with chronically dysfunctional myocardium. Patients will be followed for 3 years. Our hypothesis is that tissue-Doppler-derived analysis of positive preejection velocity allows to select optimal responders to revascularization; it means individuals with the greatest benefit in terms of LV remodeling and long-term prognosis.

The purpose of this study is to explore the severity of malnutrition and inflammation in Taiwanese hemodialysis patients.

The goal of this study is to better characterize peripartum cardiomyoapthy or pregnancy-related cardiomyopathy by enrolling as many PPCM survivors as possible using both direct and web-based methods of recritment. Patients will anser a questionnaire regarding the onset, progression, treatment and follow-up of their diagnosis as well as the psychosocial aspects of PPCM.

Sudden cardiac arrest is one of the most common causes of death in industrial countries. The main objective of this study is to built up a register of all out-of hospital resuscitation in a defined area. According to this register, it is possible to evaluate for example predictors of survival to improve training and organisation of prehospital resuscitations.

The association between cancer and thrombosis is well known and the occurrence of thrombotic complications is commonly associated with poor prognosis. The aim os this study is to determine the possible value of hypercoagulable parameters as prognostic parameters in advanced non-small cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC).

It is known that the foramen ovale closes in most infants during the first 6 months of life, however, most of the important papers in the field concentrated on observing infants with murmurs and following those with patent foramen ovale by echocardiography until 6-24 months. The purpose of this study is to observe the natural profile of closure of the foramen ovale and ductus arteriosus for the first 36 hours after birth. This understanding may help to avoid unnecessary treatment and exams for newborns with findings that are natural for their stage of development.

Rationale: Forced spirometry maneuvers are not routinely performed in patients with Ataxia Telangiectasia (A-T), even though they suffer from respiratory illnesses. Objectives: To study the feasibility and validity of forced spirometry in A-T patients. Methods: Patients will perform spirometry during clinical visits. Parameters studied will be technical quality, relation to predicted values, age, pulmonary illness, body mass index, mutational status and mutation.