Vol 45, No 3 (1964)

One of the most important tasks of medical science and public health practice is the control of infectious diseases, including those with natural foci. The ultimate elimination of certain naturally occurring focal infections is a realistic and scientifically proven task.

Toxoplasmosis has attracted the attention of doctors of many specialities in recent years. This infection has been found to be naturally focal in nature. We decided to test for toxoplasmosis infection by means of RSc and skin allergy testing in the following populations: pregnant women with a normal course of pregnancy (101); pregnant women with a history of a history of complications (spontaneous miscarriage, prematurity, birth of children with congenital defects) (148); maternity hospital workers (74); workers of the Biryulinsky fur farm (83); healthy children having contact with animals (24) and those without (10); children with psychomotor retardation and Down's disease (43).

In the conditions of the Tatar ASSR with its rich water resources, the epidemiology of diphyllobothriosis in the regional pathology of helminth infections occupies one of the important places. Before 1963 there was no mass examination of the TASSR population for contamination with broad lenticella.

Due to the rapid development of virology, new clinical and epidemiological data on influenza-like diseases caused by adenoviruses have been published. These diseases are often regarded by practitioners as influenza, upper respiratory tract catarrh, tracheobronchitis, pneumonia, and are often mistaken for diphtheria when there are superficial necroses or limited deposits on upper respiratory mucosa or the conjunctivae. Virological studies can decipher this composite group of diseases similar to influenza or diphtheria.

During the autumn 1957 pandemic in Kazan, virus A2 caused nearly 100% of all laboratory-confirmed cases; during the relatively benign 1958 outbreaks, 80%; during the winter 1959 outbreak, 74%; after this epidemic in the second half of 1959, in 1960 and early 1961, 71%; during epidemic outbreaks in 1961 and 1962, almost 100%.

Typhoid fever in children has a very diverse clinical picture. Young children often have forms of the disease resembling toxic dyspepsia, sepsis, meningitis (G. F. Vogralik, 1931; I. R. Gershenovich, 1962 and others). One of the peculiarities of the clinical course of this disease in children is the frequency of cases with remitting fever and respiratory changes in the absence of bradycardia (I.F. Filatov, 1895; V.S. Shmeleva, 1953 and others).

Duration of course of disease, difficulties of differential diagnosis, treatment, epidemiological significance give considerable importance to the problem of chronic dysentery. Long-term experience of work in this field gives us an opportunity once again to draw attention to diagnostic difficulties at recognition of chronic dysentery, to necessity of elucidation of reasons of formation of this disease, study of features of its course at each patient. Only correct estimation of specified data received at comprehensive examination of patients, allows to individualize treatment process and to reach stable results of treatment.

Studies of recent years have characterized conditions of different viability of dysentery bacteria in faeces of patients, which has certain significance for dysentery epidemiology. As shown by studies of M. S. Idina (1959), periods of persistence of dysentery microbes in faeces depend on temperature: maximum period of detection of a pathogen in faeces at glacier temperature was equal to 61 days, at room temperature - 28 days.

In the epidemiology of acute intestinal diseases and helminth infections, vegetables and fruit eaten raw are very important, as shown by studies by many authors that have established a high contamination of vegetables with dysentery bacteria, helminth eggs and protozoan cysts.

Most authors see the basis of the pathogenesis of hemorrhagic vasculitis in the hyperergic reaction of the vascular system of the sensitized organism (A. F. Tour, G. Matangina, E. E. Granat, 3. A. Danilina, etc.). In recent years there have been published works in which hemorrhagic vasculitis is attributed to the group of collagenosis (E. M. Tareev, Ruben, Harkavy, etc.), and there is emerging data on the autoimmune origin of the disease (W. Dameschek et al.).

Domestic scientists (H. N. Anichkov, G. F. Lang, M. P. Konchalovsky, A. L. Myasnikov, L. M. Antonov) stated the frequent combination of atherosclerosis and hypertension. The coincidence of these two diseases with certain vasomotor and metabolic disturbances has been established, among the latter disturbances of protein-cholesterol metabolism being of importance (M.V. Bavina, M.P. Kritsman, G.V. Troitsky and L.S. Tarasova, Bengold, Hoffman, Fischberg et al.) Of particular interest is the study of dysproteinemia in hypertension, since the literature data on this issue are contradictory.

Many authors believe that the increased breakdown of lipoproteins and the release of cholesterol in the body create favourable conditions for cholesterol infiltration of arterial vessels. Therefore, clinicians have become interested in the strength of the bond between protein and lipids in these complex compounds.

In 1953, Smith applied his test of uterine sensitivity to oxytocin to establish the effectiveness of inducing labour by rupturing the fetal bladder. Gublein, Baumgarten (1960) and others tried to use this test to determine uterine sensitivity without amniotomy. The degree of sensitivity, according to these authors, indicates the readiness of the uterus for spontaneous contractions and determines the effectiveness of birth stimulation procedures. Given the practical importance of this test for inducing labour, especially in cases of doubtful gestation, we aimed to validate this test under clinical conditions and give it an objective assessment.

Electrophoretic separation of serum proteins was carried out in a F.W. Flin and de Mayo chamber by the method of A.E. Gurvitch followed by elution and photocolorimetry (FEC-M). Total protein was determined by the microcolloidal method. 102 women with late toxicosis of pregnancy were examined. The control group consisted of 10 healthy non-pregnant and 80 healthy women in the second half of pregnancy.

Since 1955, 78 patients were treated in Penza Regional Hospital for terminal conditions, with stable positive effect in 39 patients. The causes of terminal conditions were surgical trauma in 36 patients, mechanical trauma in 24 patients, intoxication in 7 patients, acute abdominal surgery in 6 patients, bleeding in 3 patients, pulmonary artery thrombosis in 2 patients.

Although gastrogenic tetany, the most severe complication of gastric and duodenal ulcers, was first described in 1869, it is not well known to the general medical community.

As echinococcal cysts of the prostate may give rise to confusion with other diseases, the following observation is not without interest. K, 54 years old, was admitted to the clinic on 11/VII with a diagnosis of adenoma of the prostate, acute urinary retention. Urine discharged by rubber catheter was of the colour of meat slop. Prostate was sharply enlarged, dense, no borders were defined, surface was uneven. The external genitalia are undistinguished. Prostate cancer was suspected.

Splitting osteochondritis (König's disease) mainly affects the knee joint, much less frequently the elbow, ankle and in extremely rare cases the shoulder and hip joints. The disease is manifested by aseptic necrosis and rejection of the bone tissue in the area adjacent to the articular cartilage, with the surface facing the joint remaining smooth and covered by cartilage, and the surface of the margin being roughened. Occasionally, the detached area will fall out into the joint cavity, which can give the clinical picture of a blockage of the affected joint.

On 14/I 1962 at around 1 p.m. the landlady turned on the gas central heating system and the three children - M., aged 13, S., 7 and V., 9 - started bathing in the bathtub, having locked the door from the inside. Around 2 p.m., she called to the children and knocked on the door, but no one answered. She pulled the door off the hook and found the children lying face up in the bathtub, completely submerged in water.

Patients with acute abdominal diseases constitute a notable percentage of those served by the ambulance service. The main objective of the emergency physician is first and foremost the recognition of such diseases and urgent hospitalisation, because their outcome depends on timely surgical intervention, or, in other words, timely hospitalisation.

One of the sections of gynaecology poorly studied in theory and difficult in practice is malignant tumours of the appendages of the uterus. Already in our previous work on this subject (Proceedings of the First All-Russian Conference of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, 1958) we pointed out a number of shortcomings in the control of these tumours and some measures for their elimination. To find out how the situation changed during 1957-61, we used observations from the gynaecological department of the Republican Clinical Hospital, serving mainly the rural population.

Although local anaesthesia using the creeping infiltrate method, proposed by Prof. A. V. Vishnevsky, has been widely used in surgical practice, the technique is still imperfect. For example, when injecting large amounts of novocaine solution, the use of conventional syringes prolongs the operation. To avoid this, a whole series of continuous syringes has been proposed in recent years.

There are two views on the clinical relevance of vectorcardiography (VCG). Some believe that it can provide data that scalar ECGs cannot. Others (and they are probably the majority) do not see any advantages in the VCG method of examining patients in comparison with a conventional ECG. However, this difference of opinion applies only to the value of VCG as a clinical examination method; the role of VCG in the study of the patterns of the electric field generated by the heart, as well as in the proper understanding of normal and pathological ECG curves, is acknowledged by everyone working in this field.

M.P. Chumakov (Moscow) noted that as a result of nearly five years of vaccinating the population of the Soviet Union with the Soviet live attenuated vaccine 1) the carriage of wild strains of the poliomyelitis virus in the USSR has practically ceased; 2) no etiological link with poliovirus of paralytic disease in children registered as poliomyelitis (in Moscow such patients more often isolated viruses of the Coxsackievirus group); 3) most children under 1 year of age either have no antibodies to poliovirus or are detected in low titers. This dictates that children should be vaccinated against poliomyelitis from 2 months of age.

In his report to the Congress, S. V. Kurashov, Minister of Health of the USSR, pointed out the importance of developing the issues of prevention and treatment of alcoholism, as the new tasks of educating the Soviet man prompted special attention to this. Medics should be the initiators in raising all questions relating to the problem of combating alcoholism, for they know better and more intimately than anyone else the grave consequences of alcoholism.

Earlier it was thought that the main way of penetration of aeroions into the body was through the respiratory apparatus. L.L. Vasiliev (Leningrad) and A.L. Chizhevsky (Moscow) believed that the air of the alveoli and the blood exchange electrical charges, which are then carried through the blood vessels to the organs and tissues. In addition to the electrohumoral effect, a neuroreflex mechanism of ion action through centripetal pulmonary nerve fibers was also assumed.

S. Ya. Kaplinsky (Moscow) emphasized that quantitative changes in the ratios of individual protein fractions of blood serum in different pathological conditions in humans and animals are not specific to any one pathological syndrome. Qualitative disorders detected by changes in the immunological properties of proteins or by changes in the content of sulfhydryl groups and amino acids are more specific.