Abstract: A helmet device with retractable visor conceals a retractable visor within a safety helmet wherein the visor is extendable when necessary to protect a wearer against wind and rain. The device includes a rigid shell configured to cover a human head. The shell has a top portion, an open bottom portion, and a pair of sides extending between the top portion and the open bottom portion. A gap is formed between the sides and the top portion of the shell. A visor is retractable into the shell and is selectively positionable between an extended position and a storage position wherein the visor exposes the gap in the storage position and covers the gap in the extended position. A tab is coupled to the visor and extends outwardly from a bottom edge of the visor wherein the tab is configured to prevent the visor from extending fully into the shell.

Abstract: A stent deployment catheter includes a catheter body extending to an elongated distal end portion adapted for supporting and deploying a stent having a cylindrically shaped sidewall expandable in a vessel lumen to treat lesions. The distal end portion bearing the stent is guided within vessel lumen to a site therein to treat the lesions. Two guide wires are placed one in each of the bifurcations of a branched vessel. A guide wire lumen in the catheter is used to direct the elongated distal end portion along the guide wire to a vessel branch containing the lesions and a side branch guide wire lumen protectively isolates a length of a side branch guide wire from the stent when supported by the elongated distal end portion to establish a predetermined deployment site for a distal end portion and a proximal end portion of the stent for treating lesions of the first branch.

Abstract: A stent deploying catheter and method for placing a stent in a branching anatomic duct commencing at the ostium includes a distal portion containing a forward facing abutment surface laterally offset from a proximal end of a forward extending stent carrier. The forward facing abutment surface overlies the radio opaque marker to aid in the orientation and placement of the stent. The forwarding extending stent carrier in one embodiment includes a catheter balloon and having a length sufficient for supporting and deploying a stent to treat an ostial bifurcation lesion. The stent carrier in another embodiment includes a sheathing which can be retracted for deploying a self-expanding stent. An actuator wire extends along the catheter for angularly displacing the distal end portion in a body vessel to align the abutment surface with a common vessel wall at the crux of a vessel bifurcation and align the stent carrier along the site of the ostial bifurcation lesion.

Abstract: There is provided an excimer laser catheter which also has at the distal end thereof a tip-deflecting wire, such as a relatively small-size balloon catheter, one which is located alongside and to one side of the laser catheter and is adapted to be used by being activated to cause the laser to be located eccentrically with respect to the lumen of the blood vessel which it has entered and to be directed at adjacently located plaque which the laser would otherwise miss. With equipment of this kind, it is possible to perform in many instances a satisfactory angioplasty essentially with the laser alone, without incurring the delays and the risks and other drawbacks involved in using the conventional adjunctive balloon-catheter angioplasty following laser angioplasty. An ultrasonic transducer and a catheter tip is used to determine the location and morphology of atherosclerotic blockage.

Abstract: A method for the determination of glycated protein in a sample characterised in that it comprises treating the sample with a protease and treating the protease-treated sample with a ketoamine oxidase, a product of this reaction being measured is disclosed.

Abstract: An immobilised hydantoinase containing a divalent metal ion selected from Mn.sup.++, Co.sup.++, Fe.sup.++, Ni.sup.++ and Mg.sup.++ is produced that is useful for the preparation of a D(-)(optionally substituted phenyl)glycine or N-carbamoyl derivative thereof by hydrolysis of a 5-(optionally substituted phenyl)hydantoin in the absence of air. Immobilization is carried out in the presence of the metal iona nd the metal ion stabilizes the hydantoinase and renders it capable of repeated re-use. The divalent metal ion may also be added to a reaction mixture containing the immobilized hydantoinase to minimize reduction of hydantoinase activity during hydrolysis of hydantoin. Cells that produce hydantoinase may be immobilized within or on a support, or hydantoinase separated from cells can be adsorbed on a positively charged polymeric support such as an ion exchange resin or covalently bonded to a polymeric support. A cross-linking agent such as glutaraldehyde may be used in immobilization.