To assess coagulation activation and endothclial cell injury in normotensive and pre-eclamptic pregnant women, a comparision was made of plama levels of tissue factor, fibronectin, fibrinopeptide A and D-dimer. Samples were taken from 50 nonpregnant women, 40 normotensive pregnant women in the third trimester and 27 women with pre-eclampsia after diagnosis and before treatment. High levels of fibrinopeptide A and D-dimer were found in pre-eclamptic women. Moreover, the ratio fibrinopeptide AD-dimer was much greater in the pre-eclampsia group than in normotensive pregnant women. The levels of fibronectin and tissue factor were also higher in the pre-eclampsia group. The increase of tissue factor levels suggests an alteration of the extrinsic coagulation pathway in pre-eclampsia. The increase of fibrinopeptide A:D-dimer ratio shows that the activation of coagulation is associated with a relative hypofibrinolysis in pre-eclampsia.

In a series of 215 anteroposterior X-ray films, a study was made of the horizontal distance between the pedicles of each lumbar vertebra, first of all sequentially, describing the morphology adopted by the lateral limits of the canal, and secondly determining the absolute value for each level separately and in relation to the variables of sex and age. The absolute value of this distance at each level is related to the thickness of the pedicles and the width of the vertebral bodies of L3 and L4. The values obtained were tested with the appropriate statistics in each case.

The fracture of the medial orbital wall is relatively common in orbital trauma. Titanium mesh is possibly the actual standard material for orbital wall reconstruction. When the floor of the orbit and the medial wall are simultaneously affected, one larger mesh gives better results than two independent meshes that need to be fixated independently. However, large meshes need a wider surgical field. To gain sufficient exposure to the medial and inferior orbital walls simultaneously, we present an approach that combines the transconjunctival and transcaruncular incisions, detaching if needed the inferior oblique muscle and, placing our mesh, repositioning it beside the lacrimal duct. This technique should not entirely displace traditional approaches, but it widens the surgical exposure for middle-and upper-third facial trauma. This alternative has minimum morbidity and can save a great deal of surgery time.

Few studies have been performed to evaluate the ultrastructural changes that exposure to static magnetic fields (SMF) can cause to the processes of cell migration and differentiation in the cerebellum during development. Thus, we have studied the development of the cerebellum in the chick embryo (n = 144) under a uniform SMF (20 mT). All of our observations were done on folium VIc of Larsell's classification. The cerebella of chick embryos, which were exposed solely on day 6 of incubation and sacrificed at day 13 of incubation [short exposure (S)1; n = 24], showed an external granular layer (EGL) that was less dense than the EGL in the control group (n = 24). The molecular layer (ML) exhibited a low number of migratory neuroblastic elements. Moreover, the internal granular layer (IGL) was immature, with the cellular elements less abundant and more dispersed than in controls. In chick embryos exposed on day 6 of incubation and sacrificed at day 17 (S2; n = 24), the outstanding feature was the regeneration of the different layers of the cerebellar cortex. The cerebellar cortex of chick embryos exposed continuously to an identical field from the beginning of the incubation up to day 13 [long exposure (L)1; n = 24] or day 17 (L2; n = 24) of incubation showed a higher number of alterations than that of group S1. Electron microscopy confirmed the findings from light microscopy and, at the same time, showed clear signs of cell degeneration and delay in the process of neuronal differentiation. This was more apparent in groups L1 (100%) and L2 (100%) than in groups S1 (95.4%) and S2 (65.2%). In conclusion, the present study showed that SMF can induce irreversible developmental effects on the processes of cell migration and differentiation of the chick cerebellar cortex. Bioelectromagnetics 18:36–46, 1997. © 1997 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.