extracted from the Statistical Review for England and Wales, 1968 (Registrar General, 1970): the mortality in children between 1 month and 5 years of age is about 1 : 1,000 while in our group of children who had a hypsarrhythmic E.E.G. the figure is about 1 : 4.According to educational psychologists, an accepted figure for children of school age with an I.Q. above 70 is about 97%, while in our series only 23% of the surviving patients achieved this level. If we then consider 30/ as an accepted figure for mentally subnormal children in the general population, the figure in our series is of the order of 770%. These findings therefore suggest that the presence of a hypsarrhythmic E.E.G. in the first year of life, irrespective of the clinical symptomatology at the time and largely irrespective of therapy, carries grave prognostic implications in terms of incidence of mental subnormality and early death. Since not all infants with a severe neurological illness in the first year of life develop hypsarrhythmia in their E.E.G., it is tempting to suggest that the presence of hypsarrhythmia might indicate a special type, or group, of disorders as yet unidentified.

Twenty healthy volunteers were treated for 3 months with oxpenifylline (200 mg 3-times a day) or a placebo in a controlled double-blind randomized trial. The volunteers taking the oxpenifylline showed a significant increase in their fibrinolytic activity, as assessed by the dilute blood clot lysis time and fibrin plate lysis area, and a significant reduction in their plasma fibrinogen levels. No change was found in the control group. These findings suggest that oxpentifylline may be valuable in the treatment of small vessel occlusive disease associated with lowered fibrinolytic activity and raised fibrinogen levels.

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Angiographic findings are described in a patient with enlarged persistent sciatic arteries and a ruptured sciatic artery aneurysm. The left persistent sciatic artery was patent and dilated to a width of 10 cm throughout its length. It had ruptured in the lower thigh. The common iliac, internal iliac, and both sciatic arteries were dilated and tortuous, with generally smooth outlines. Some patchy calcification in the arterial wall was noted. Arterial flow was extremely slow in the dilated arteries, requiring very delayed films to show the right sciatic artery as far as its bifurcation at the knee.

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