Qatar Medical Journal - Volume 2007, Issue 1

We report a male, Qatari infant, born in September 2001 at Hamad Medical Corporation (Doha, Qatar) with bilateral, asymmetric cryptophthalmos. Parents presented first degree familial consanguinity, but negative for ocular abnormalities. General physical examination was unremarkable. Ocular exam showed incomplete variety in the right eye and complete on the left eye. Partially exposed right eye exhibited total corneal opacity. The left eye B Scan Ocular Ultrasound depicted anterior megalophthalmos and enlargement of globe's axial length. CT Scan revealed anterior chamber dysgenesis in the right eye, with normal posterior segment. Cryptophthalmos is a very rare inherited condition, mainly when it appears as an isolated case and not syndromic. To our knowledge, this is the first isolated non syndromic cryptopthalmos case reported in Qatar and in the Gulf countries.

Recently it has been found that many critically ill patients develop secondary neuromuscular disorders following admission to intensive care units (ICU). One of these is critical illness polyneuropathy (CIP), a widespread symmetrical disorder affecting the peripheral nervous system and often associated with sepsis and multi-organ dysfunction. Two percent of all intensive care patients and as many as 80% of septic patients develop critical illness polyneuropathy which leads to a considerably increased risk of in-hospital mortality. The exact etiology of the condition is not known but various risk factors, differential diagnosis, treatment, management and prognosis are discussed in this report of ci woman who, following caesarian section, developed CIP, septic shock, multi-organ failure and subsequently died.

A 56-year-old male presented with a history of right loin pain of two months duration. Physical examination showed a firm non-tender mass in the left upper quadrant. Blood and urinary investigations including serum Cortisol and urinary cathecholamines were normal. CT scan showed an oval, welldefined, heterogeneous mass measuring 14-10 cm. in the region of the left suprarenal gland (Fig. 1). There was no evidence of infiltration into the surrounding tissue. In view of the size and supra-renal location of the mass it was decided to remove the retroperitoneal tumor and the ipsilateral adrenal gland through a left thoraco-abdominal incision to permit adequate exposure and vascular control.

The patient was admitted to Medical ICU because of severe shortness of breath and fever. The patient is known case of renal transplant using immunosuppressant medications. Deep endotracheal tube aspirate reported as, Gram's stain showed delicate, filamentous, branching gram positive rods. Acid-fast staining showed partially acid fast filamentous branching rods.

Epilepsy is one of the commonest neurological disorders with increasing incidence over the last few decades.

As with many neurological disorders, the incidence of the disease is slightly higher in females than males and certain measures or precautions have to be addressed by the treating Physician(s) when treating females with epilepsy as failure to do so my involve medico-legal implications.

Aim: To assess the exocrine pancreatic function among cystic fibrosis patients with cystic fibrosis trans-membrane conductance regulator (CFTR) 11234V mutation. METHODS: Cross-sectional study of 40 cystic fibrosis patients with homozygous CFTR 11234V mutation belonging to a large Arab kindred family and 25 healthy subjects as a control group over a period of 12 mo. Assessment of their exocrine pancreatic function was performed by measuring faecal elastase-1 (FE1) concentration with a commercial ELISA kit using polyclonal antibodies (BioServ Diagnostics) in CF patients compared to healthy subjects. The results were compared with those obtained from a second laboratory using another commercial ELISA (ScheBo; Biotech, Germany) that uses two monoclonal antibodies against different specific epitopes of human pancreatic elastase. RESULTS: All CF patients with CFTR 11234V mutation had normal levels of faecal elastase 1. No significant difference was found between the two methods for the CF groups or between the CF patients with and without pancreatic enzyme replacement.

Contex: In assessing the patient with headache, clinicians are often faced with 2 important questions: Is this headache a migraine? Does this patient require neuroimaging? The diagnosis of migraine can direct therapy, and information obtained from the history and physical examination is used by physicians to determine which patients require neuroimaging.