There is a big waste generation nowadays due to the growing demand for innovation and the fact that more and more products have a reduced lifetime, increasing the volume of dumps and landfills. Currently, one of the segments of large volume is the technology waste, which reflects on the printed circuit boards (PCBs) that are the basis of the electronics industry. This type of waste disposal is difficult, given that recycling is complex and expensive, because of the diversity of existing materials and components, and their difficult separation process. Regarding the material involved in PCBs, there are metal fractions (MFs) and non-metallic fractions (NMFs), of which the recycling of NMFs is one of the most important and difficult processes, because they amount to about 70% of the weight of the PCB’s waste. In the present paper, a literature review of the recycling of non-metallic fractions (NMFs) has been carried out, showing different studies and guidelines regarding this type of recycling, emphasizing that this type of waste still lacks for further application.

Variceal hemorrhage continues to be a major cause of morbidity and mortality in cirrhotic patients. Transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (TIPS) is gaining wide acceptance as a treatment for several complications of portal hypertension. The aim of the current randomized study was to compare the transjugular shunt and endoscopic sclerotherapy (ES) for the prevention of variceal rebleeding (VB) in cirrhotic patients. Forty-six consecutive cirrhotic patients with variceal bleeding were randomly allocated to receive either transjugular shunt (22 patients) or ES (24 patients) 24 hours after control of bleeding. VB (50% vs. 9%) and early (first 6 weeks) VB (33% vs. 5%) were significantly more frequent in sclerotherapy patients; the actuarial probability of being free of VB was higher in the shunt group (P F .002). Eight patients (33%) of the sclerotherapy group and 3 patients (15%) of the shunt group died; the actuarial probability of survival was higher for the shunted patients (P F .05); 6 patients in the sclerotherapy group and none in the shunt group died from VB (P F .05). No difference was found in the proportion of patients with clinically evident hepatic encephalopathy (HE). These results show that the transjugular shunt is more effective than sclerotherapy in the prevention of both early and long-term VB. Moreover, a significant improvement in survival was found in the shunt group. (HEPATOLOGY 1999;29:27-32.)Variceal bleeding in cirrhotic patients is the most important complication of portal hypertension for two main reasons: the high mortality of each episode of bleeding and the high proportion of patients that rebleed with the associated additional risk of death. 1,2 This second fact makes mandatory the application of therapeutic strategies to prevent recurrent hemorrhage. 3 The best results in terms of rebleeding prevention are obtained by surgical portal systemic shunts but are associated with high procedural mortality and high incidence of encephalopathy; this has limited its wide application and has encouraged investigations on other therapeutic options like endoscopic sclerotherapy (ES) and band ligation and drugs. 4 More recently, transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (TIPS) has been introduced in clinical use for several complications of portal hypertension 5 ; it enables the decompression of the portal venous system by means of a communication between the hepatic and the portal veins through the liver parenchyma with a percutaneous approach avoiding the risks and limitations of surgery. Several initial series have suggested that it could be of great value for variceal bleeding, 6,7 but data from comparative studies with accepted therapies are scarce. [8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15] Our aim was to compare TIPS with a widely accepted therapy with low procedural mortality and morbidity and low inclusion limitations, like ES, for the prevention of variceal rebleeding (VB) in cirrhotic patients. PATIENTS AND METHODSStudy Design. All patients presenting with a variceal hemorrhage were resusc...

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