Active clinical trials for "Syndrome"

To prospectively investigate the effect of transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (TIPS) on oxygenation in cirrhotic patients with hepatopulmonary syndrome (HPS).

Dysautonomia, primarily defined as postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS) can seriously disrupt a child's daily activities. It is most commonly associated with nausea or abdominal pain. In preliminary studies, when orthostatic intolerance was treated with fludrocortisone, a standard therapy for orthostatic intolerance (OI), symptomatic improvement in nausea was observed. However, children with POTS were also observed to have higher supine mean arterial pressure (MAP) (preliminary data) and greater suppression of the baroreceptor reflex sensitivity (BRS) occurred upon up-right tilt. While fludrocortisone alleviates nausea associated with OI, its long-term use may pose long term health risks to children including worsening hypertension. Therefore, it is the objective of this study to define the mechanism for OI as it relates to nausea. The investigators hypothesize that OI resulting from changes in the autonomic nervous system is the likely mechanism for the nausea observed in the patients in this study. The investigators further hypothesize that this is potentially an early marker for future cardiovascular problems such as early onset hypertension and cardiac hypertrophy. The general objective of this protocol is to address this gap in knowledge by determining the autonomic characteristics of children with OI as well as defining neurohumoral profiles for these subjects to better understand the cause of the elevated supine in these subjects. By better understanding the potential mechanism for this condition, it is the investigators future goal to develop a more focused and safer treatment strategy. The investigators will study subjects between 10 to 18 years of age utilizing the tilt table to mimic daily life stressors and also measure serum levels of epinephrine, norepinephrine, rennin, angiotensin II, aldosterone, and vasopressin at baseline and during tilt. This study will generate data with high impact in that more rational treatments for management of dysautonomia could be chosen on the basis of the profile of dysautonomia and neurohumoral markers.

Over the past 30 years much has been learned about the molecular genetics and natural history of familial forms of hematuria. However, enhanced understanding of these conditions has yet to generate effective therapies for Alport syndrome(AS), the form of familial hematuria associated with end-stage renal disease. Males with AS inevitably develop end-stage kidney failure, with a 50% likelihood of dialysis or kidney transplantation by age 25 years. There is no proven treatment for AS, although studies in animals have suggested several promising potential therapies. Pharmacological or biological treatments that might delay or prevent the development of kidney failure exist, but need to be evaluated through clinical trials. Researchers interested in implementing clinical trials in AS will face several challenges, the foremost of which is the relative rarity of the disease, necessitating aggressive efforts to identify and recruit potential subjects for multi-center collaborative clinical trials. The Alport Syndrome Research Collaborative (ARC) was established in 2009 as a partnership of the Alport Syndrome Treatments and Outcomes Registry (ASTOR), the European Alport Registry and centers of AS research in Canada, China and France with the objective of testing potential treatments to delay or prevent terminal renal failure in people with AS. In this feasibility study the five ARC centers will interrogate existing AS registries and databases, and monitor accrual of new AS cases over an 18-month period, in order to quantify subjects in the disease categories of interest. As part of this project we will examine the utility of urinary uromodulin excretion as a marker of kidney injury and potential trial endpoint in AS clinical trials. Our goals are to (1) demonstrate that participating centers have access to sufficient numbers of males and females with AS to populate adequately-powered clinical trials focused on two clinical targets, microalbuminuria and overt proteinuria, and (2) to test the hypothesis that in males with AS urinary uromodulin excretion decreases as albuminuria and proteinuria increase and that uromodulin offers an independent and insightful measure of renal fibrosis and response to therapy.

The purpose of this study is to determine whether electrical pudendal nerve stimulation with acupuncture needles as electrodes has a good long-term therapeutic effect on the urgency-frequency syndrome in women.

The overarching goal of this project is to improve the clinical quality of patients with Benzodiazepine-resistant alcohol withdrawal syndrome.

Tree nuts (almonds, Brazil nuts, cashews, hazelnuts, macadamia nuts, pecans, pine nuts, pistachios and walnuts) are an important source of unsaturated fatty acids, vegetable protein, and fibre, as well as minerals, vitamins, and phytonutrients. Although heart disease risk reduction claims for nuts have been permitted in the U.S. and general dietary guidelines and recommendations from heart associations recommend the consumption of nuts for heart protection, diabetes associations have not addressed nuts in their most recent recommendations. This omission is despite heart disease being a major cause of death in diabetes. There remains insufficient information on the usefulness of these foods in diabetes. To improve evidence-based guidance for tree nut recommendations, the investigators propose to conduct a systematic review of the effect of tree nuts on diabetes control and features of the metabolic syndrome. The systematic review process allows the combining of the results from many small studies in order to arrive at a pooled estimate, similar to a weighted average, of the true effect. The investigators will be able to explore whether eating tree nuts has different effects between men and women, in different age groups and background disease states, and whether or not the effect of tree nuts depends on the dose and background diet. The findings of this proposed knowledge synthesis will help improve the health of Canadians through informing diabetes association recommendations and heart association recommendations where they relate to diabetes.

The Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) is a clinical syndrome of progressive dyspnea and refractory hypoxemia caused by various reasons. Although in recent years a variety of supportive care measures have significant progress, but the mortality rate of patients with ARDS is still as high as 35-40%. Mechanical ventilation is one of the main treatments with ARDS, which is widely used in clinical. The rational mechanical ventilation strategy can improve the oxygenation of patients with ARDS and reduce lung injury. Patients with ARDS usually have alveolar epithelial and pulmonary capillary endothelial injury, and the lesion has heterogeneity. The protective mechanical ventilation strategies chosen by patients with ARDS in clinical practice are gradually being accepted and applied. The High-frequency oscillatory ventilation (HFOV) is a ventilation way with high respiratory rate and low tidal volume. Compared with conventional mechanical ventilation, HFOV may be able to more effectively improve oxygenation and reduce ventilator-associated lung injury. HFOV and protective ventilation strategy in ARDS is consistent with an important position in the treatment of ARDS, but not been widely adopted in clinical practice and is still only as a salvage treatment. Therefore, this study intends to use HFOV treatment with conventional mechanical ventilation by matching the cases in patients with ARDS. By comparing the influences of the patient's condition and mortality with HFOV, the clinical efficacy, safety, and health economics effectiveness of HFOV are further investigated and adaption time and parameter settings of HFOV are explored, which provide better treatment options for patients with ARDS and improve their prognosis.

The structural/RSN study involves Structural and Resting State Neuroimaging. The purpose of Structural Neuroimaging is to use MRI technology to identify cortical and white matter morphometric differences between patients with chronic pain conditions and healthy control subjects. The purpose of the Resting State Neuroimaging study is to use functional MRI to identify possible disease related differences in various resting state networks in the brain. In addition we are looking at the effect gut microbiota on brain function in healthy and IBS participants. The overall goal is to identify structural and functional brain differences in persons with chronic pain conditions such as Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS, Cyclical Vomiting Syndrome(CVS) and vestibulodynia/vulvodynia. We are also looking at Inflammatory Bowel Disease(ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease. We will be comparing differences between these conditions and matched healthy control subjects.

Obstructive Sleep Apnoea Hypopnoea Syndrome(OSAHS)affects at least 4% of males and 2% of females. OSAHS is the combination of excessive daytime sleepiness, snoring and apnoeas (stopping breathing at night). As well as affecting tiredness, mood, concentration and quality of life - there is growing concern that it can increase the risk of high blood pressure, heart problems, strokes and thromboses (clots in the veins). It appears that OSAHS may affect the thickness of the blood and cause it to clot more easily it also causes damage to the lining of the blood vessels (endothelial injury). These effects seem independent of other risk factors such as obesity, smoking, family history of clots etc. The investigators are testing new biomarkers: gel point and fractal dimension developed at the Swansea University to measure the 'clotting' of the blood in people with OSAHS and a similar group of people who snore and who are sleepy but do not have OSAHS on sleep studies (Controls) Also markers of vascular inflammation are being measured.

This is a multicenter, double-blind, randomized trial to assess the efficacy and safety of colchicine for post-pericardiotomy syndrome prevention, post-operative effusions prevention, and post-operative atrial fibrillation prevention.