Universidad Católica de Costa Rica

The present study evaluates the safety and efficacy of allogeneic pluripotent non-tumorigenic adipose stem cells (PASCs) intravenously (IV) injected in a patient with classical Parkinson's disease. PASCs were isolated from lipoaspirate material; pluripotency, teratogenesis, chromosomal integrity, and purity were determined accordingly. The patient was injected intravenously with 3 doses of 25 x 10 6 PASCs over time (0, 3, 10 months), and safety and symptom improvements were assessed at 0, 3, 10, and 16 months using validated clinical measurements. The patient exhibited no adverse effects from the PASC transplantation over 16 months of treatment, with significant improvements in activities of daily living, motor function, fall risk, and balance. This case report demonstrates safety and significant improvements in critical clinical outcomes of intravenous allogenic pluripotent nontumorigenic PASC transplantation, making PASCs an excellent candidate for cell therapy in patients with PD.

El ambiente político, social y económico del Imperio romano, durante la segunda mitad del siglo iii, puede considerarse sombrío, especialmente entre los años 249-274. Para la época, el pensamiento del filósofo neoplatónico Plotino (205-270) despertó un gran interés, pues logró articular en un lenguaje filosófico las experiencias espirituales y orientó espiritualmente a quienes no eran filósofos. Entre quienes asisten a su escuela, encontramos cristianos, pertenecientes a diferentes sectas gnósticas. La relación con el gnosticismo pasa por diferentes etapas; en la primera, se nota una serie de convergencias, que disimulan bastante los desacuerdos. El autor de este artículo analiza desde el esquema ascensional o de Anábasis propuesto en la Enéada I, 6, las convergencias con el gnosticismo, principalmente de tipo valentianiano, sethiano u ofita. Además de las convergencias lingüísticas, la correspondencia entre el Neoplatónico y los gnósticos es de contenido: el regreso del alma a la patria (=padre), la purificación, la mediación del Intelecto y ciertos atisbos sobre la patria.

The population of patients with congenital heart disease (CHD) is continuously increasing with more and more patients reaching adulthood. A significant portion of these young adults will suffer from arrhythmias due to the underlying congenital heart defect itself or as a sequela of interventional or surgical treatment. The medical community will encounter an increasing challenge as even most of the individuals with complex congenital heart defects nowadays become young adults. Within the past 20 years, management of patients with arrhythmias has gained remarkable progress including pharmacological treatment, catheter ablation, and device therapy. Catheter ablation in patients with CHD has paralleled the advances of this technology in pediatric and adult patients with structurally normal hearts. Growing experience and introduction of new techniques like the 3D mapping systems into clinical practice have been particularly beneficial for this growing population of patients with abnormal cardiac anatomy and physiology. Finally, device therapies allowing maintanence of chronotropic competence and AV conduction, improving haemodynamics by cardiac resynchronization, and preventing sudden death are increasingly used. For pharmacological therapy, ablation procedures, and device therapy decision making requires a deep understanding of the individual pathological anatomy and physiology as well as detailed knowledge on natural history and long-term prognosis of our patients. Composing expert opinions from cardiology and paediatric cardiology as well as from non-invasive and invasive electrophysiology this position paper was designed to state the art in management of young individuals with congenital heart defects and arrhythmias.

Formal educational systems aim, among other objectives, to train citizens; that is, to provide students with the tools to exercise their freedom responsibly, in harmony with the principles of social coexistence. However, during the last decades, there has been an increase in the rate of indebtedness, which seems to distort these principles, promoting an increasingly individualized culture subservient to a market that educates for consumption rather than for citizenship, which could be causing the displacement of several principles of formal education. This article presents the results of a qualitative study, the purpose of which is to analyze the perception of young people regarding the exercise of citizenship and select consumption habits, as well as to analyze the role played by the mass media through advertising in promoting the acquisition of products through trends that seemingly increase indebtedness.

El presente ensayo se circunscribe dentro de la bioética, pues desarrolla un análisis al caso del español Ramón Sampedro, reflexionando las tensiones que se generan a partir de su deseo de muerte asistida, como mecanismo para alcanzar la muerte digna. La novedad del presente estudio radica en la utilización del principio de la alteridad y el contextual, sin acudir a los principios de Tom L. Beauchamp y James F. Childress, con el<br />objetivo de establecer un parámetro de análisis alterno a casos similares.

Actualmente la sociedad atraviesa una etapa muy interesante, incidida por las tecnologías de la información y la comunicación (TIC), nuevos descubrimientos de la neurociencia que proponen formas distintas de analizar los estilos de aprendizaje, además de las teorías tradicionales que han nutrido la profesión docente. Sumado a lo anterior, la población costarricense presenta un envejecimiento demográfico con tendencia al aumento, por tanto este ensayo propone considerar a las TIC como herramientas de aprendizaje, promovidas desde una enfoque andragógico que coadyuve a la creación de propuestas de procesos de formación dirigidos a la población adulta que apuesten hacia la eficacia, de modo que se promueva una humanización del aprendizaje, tomando como; base dos fenómenos presentes en la naturaleza propia del ser humano: la vida cotidiana y la problematización como ámbitos de acción. Actually the society crosses an age very interesting, and it is affect by of the information and communication technologies (ICT), the new discoveries by neuroscience propose different ways to analysis the human learn systems, also traditional theories that have constructed the educational job. Also, the Costa Rican society presents a demographic aging with trend to the increase; therefore this test proposes to consider the ICT like knowledge tools from the andragogy theory to create educational proposes to adult persons, as propose to bring efficient process to adult population, by promotion of humanizing learning, based by daily events experiences of the person and the daily critic theory of Paulo Freire as action platforms.

This article describes the patients and activities of the Pediatric Palliative Care and Pain Control Clinic of the National Children's Hospital (PPCPCC NCH) in San Jose, Costa Rica Central America, founded in 1990, is the first such clinic in the country. This study includes all the children and adolescents referred to the PPCPCC NCH from January 2000 to December 2008. This is a quantitative and descriptive study. We used a simple format that included variables such as age, sex, diagnostic, place of reference, pain, and other symptoms. The database initially registered a total of 1470 patients; 25 of these were excluded from the study because of incomplete information, leaving a total of 1445 registered cases for the analysis. The average number of patients admitted was 156 per year. Malignant tumor was the principal diagnosis at the time of admission, followed by central nervous system abnormalities. Pain was the most frequent symptom. Most patients were visited or examined at home and/or the pediatric palliative care day center and died in their own home. The initial analysis enabled us to obtain information and feedback about the work of the PPCPCC. We are now able to understand more fully the needs of pediatric palliative care in Costa Rica such as increasing the coverage of pediatric patients who require palliative care, improving our resources, further defining the criteria for admission of patients to a palliative care program, and developing standards for measuring and recording symptoms besides pain.

<p style="text-align: justify;">Se probó la Escala de Adhesión al Tratamiento de la Diabetes Mellitus tipo II-versión III (EATDM-III©), la cual estaba compuesta por los factores apoyo familiar, organización y apoyo comunal, ejercicio físico, control médico, higiene y autocuidado, dieta y valoración de la condición física. La investigación se realizó en centros de salud públicos de la zona norte de Costa Rica, y se aplicó a una muestra de 59 personas de ambos géneros entre febrero y marzo de 2006. El instrumento demostró una confiabilidad alta (á=0,92). Se obtuvieron correlaciones significativas (p<0,05) entre cada factor y en la relación factores-escala total. La EATDM-III© es un instrumento valioso para medir la adhesión al tratamiento en personas con diabetes mellitus tipo II.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Palabras clave</strong>: adhesión al tratamiento, diabetes mellitus tipo II, confiabilidad, coeficientes de correlación, estructura factorial.</p>