Medical Definitions

Question 1

Severe Asthma

Answer 1

severe asthma is defined as asthma that requires treatment with high dose inhaled corticosteroids plus a second controller and/or systemic corticosteroids to prevent it from becoming ‘‘uncontrolled’’ or asthma that remains ‘‘uncontrolled’’ despite this therapy.

Question 2

Hemoperfusion

Answer 2

Hemoperfusion is the passage of blood through a column packed with granules of Amberlite resin which act as absorbents. In this procedure, physicochemical properties of an absorbent are used, while in hemodialysis there is a concentrational gradient between the blood and the solvent across the dialysis membrane.

Question 3

Protamine sulfate

Answer 3

Protamine sulfate was originally made from the sperm of salmon. The protamine of salmon, later named “salmine”, which can be extracted with hydrochloric acid and precipitated with platinum chloride, corresponds to about 26.8 % of the dried sperm. Protamine sulfate was approved for medical use in 1969 and now it is mainly made using recombinant biotechnology.

Protamine sulfate replaced hexadimethrine bromide (Polybrene), another cationic agent that was the original heparin reversal agent in the early days of heart surgery, until studies in the 1960s suggested that hexadimethrine bromide might cause kidney failure when used in doses in excess of its therapeutic range.[21]