Assessment of microbiological contamination in different catering units related to food handling in the district of Bragança

The catering industry has developed over time, increasing the concern about the health and nutritional quality of the food. Therefore producers and food establishments are under pressure to improve the quality of their products and services in order to assure that food is safe and suitable for consumption. The microbial contamination of food is a major public health problem since it affects millions of people worldwide. Poor hygiene practices within the food processing environment can cause the contamination of food with pathogenic particles, which is a risk for the consumers health and safety. In establishments where food is manufactured and served, several measures regarding the control of the microbiologic contamination are needed. The majors microorganisms associated to food contamination are the bacterias due to the fact that they have a high pathogenicity and diversity. For an assessment of the hygienic conditions related to food handling is essential to know the sanitary conditions of the establishments since they can reduce the risks of food contamination. These food contaminations can cause adverse human health problems

Cysteine allows ovarian cancer cells to adapt to hypoxia and to escape from carboplatin cytotoxicity

The authors would like to acknowledge the Instituto Portugues de Oncologia de Lisboa Francisco Gentil (IPOLFG) for partially funding the project. We would also like to acknowledge Dr Dialina Brilhante and Dr. Teresa Guerreiro (Servico de Imuno-hemoterapia, IPOLFG) for providing blood donors samples; to Dr Humberto Goncalves (Pharmacy, IPOLFG) for paclitaxel and carboplatin preparation, and Marta Teixeira (IBET) for the technical support in 3D models. The study was also funded by Projecto TVI. This research was supported by Fundacao para a Ciencia e Tecnologia (FCT) (PhD ProRegeM program, PD/BD/105893/2014, FCT fellowship, PD/BD/105768/2014). iNOVA4Health - UID/Multi/04462/2013, a program financially supported by Fundacao para a Ciencia e Tecnologia/Ministerio da Educacao e Ciencia, through national funds and co-funded by FEDER under the PT2020 Partnership Agreement is acknowledged.Ovarian cancer is the second most common gynaecologic malignancy and the main cause of death from gynaecologic cancer, due to late diagnosis and chemoresistance. Studies have reported the role of cysteine in cancer, by contributing for hydrogen sulphide (H2S) generation and as a precursor of glutathione (GSH). However, the role of cysteine in the adaptation to hypoxia and therapy response remains unclear. We used several ovarian cancer cell lines, ES2, OVCAR3, OVCAR8, A2780 and A2780cisR, to clarify cysteine relevance in ovarian cancer cells survival upon hypoxia and carboplatin. Results show that ES2 and OVCAR8 cells presented a stronger dependence on cysteine availability upon hypoxia and carboplatin exposure than OVCAR3 cells. Interestingly, the A2780 cisR, but not A2780 parental cells, benefits from cysteine upon carboplatin exposure, showing that cysteine is crucial for chemoresistance. Moreover, GSH degradation and subsequent cysteine recycling pathway is associated with ovarian cancer as seen in peripheral blood serum from patients. Higher levels of total free cysteine (Cys) and homocysteine (HCys) were found in ovarian cancer patients in comparison with benign tumours and lower levels of GSH were found in ovarian neoplasms patients in comparison with healthy individuals. Importantly, the total and S-Homocysteinylated levels distinguished blood donors from patients with neoplasms as well as patients with benign from patients with malignant tumours. The levels of S-cysteinylated proteins distinguish blood donors from patients with neoplasms and the free levels of Cys in serum distinguish blood from patients with benign tumours from patients with malignant tumours. Herein we disclosed that cysteine contributes for a worse disease prognosis, allowing faster adaptation to hypoxia and protecting cells from carboplatin. The measurement of serum cysteine levels can be an effective tool for early diagnosis, for outcome prediction and follow up of disease progression.publishersversionpublishe

Neonatal Encephalopathy: etiology and morbidity

Trabalho Final do Mestrado Integrado em Medicina apresentado à Faculdade de MedicinaEncefalopatia neonatal designa uma síndrome clínica de disfunção neurológica que se manifesta no período neonatal. A sua apresentação pode ser muito variada, mas as crises epiléticas neonatais e a depressão do estado neurológico são as mais comuns. Pode ter múltiplas etiologias, sendo a encefalopatia hipóxico-isquémica (EHI) a mais frequente. Apesar da multiplicidade de causas, os doentes apresentam elevada morbimortalidade, sendo a paralisia cerebral e a epilepsia as sequelas mais comuns.O objetivo é caracterizar sob o ponto de vista etiológico um grupo de recém-nascidos diagnosticados com encefalopatia neonatal, nascidos entre 2010 e 2014, e avaliar as sequelas e comorbilidades após pelo menos três anos de seguimento.Trata-se de um estudo retrospetivo, de análise descritiva, dos recém-nascidos com idade gestacional igual ou superior a 36 semanas e que realizaram vídeo-eletroencefalograma (vídeo-EEG) no Hospital Pediátrico do Centro Hospitalar e Universitário de Coimbra (HP/CHUC) durante o período neonatal. Os processos clínicos foram consultados no processo clínico eletrónico Sclinic®; nos casos em que não se conseguiu obter um registo atualizado da informação, realizou-se uma entrevista telefónica com base num questionário pré-definido. Foram analisadas variáveis demográficas, fatores de risco, apresentação clínica, diagnóstico etiológico, resultados do vídeo-EEG e dos exames de neuroimagem, perfil de desenvolvimento psicomotor, comorbilidades e sequelas. Estudou-se, também, o seguimento em consultas hospitalares e programas de reabilitação.Assim obteve-se uma amostra de 82 crianças, com igual distribuição entre os sexos. A forma de apresentação mais comum foram as crises epiléticas neonatais (78.0%). As etiologias mais frequentes foram a EHI (59,8%), vascular (20,7%) e malformativa (8,5%).O vídeo-EEG foi normal em apenas 11 casos. Sete crianças não realizaram exame de neuroimagem. Dos restantes, apenas dez apresentaram um exame considerado normal, sendo as lesões da substância cinzenta (n=33) as mais prevalentes (com destaque do envolvimento dos gânglios da base – n=12).Da amostra inicial, obteve-se um seguimento mínimo de três anos em 64 casos, dos quais apenas 27 apresentavam um desenvolvimento psicomotor normal aos 3 anos de idade.Vinte e oito por centro dos casos desenvolveram paralisia cerebral e vinte e dois por cento epilepsia. Observou-se a existência de quatro casos com défices neurológicos sem acompanhamento por programas de reabilitação.A encefalopatia neonatal continua a associar-se a uma elevada prevalência de sequelas, de gravidade variável. Observou-se, também, uma falta de um método sistemático e universal de seguimento destes doentes, o que é prejudicial para o seu acompanhamento.Neonatal encephalopathy is a clinical syndrome of neurological disfunction that arises during the neonatal period. Although its presentation can be very variate, the most common are neonatal seizures and depressed neurologic status. It can be caused by multiple pathologies being hypoxic-ischaemic encephalopathy (HIE) the most frequent. Despite the many possible causes these patients have increased morbidity and mortality, with the later development of cerebral palsy and/or epilepsy being common consequences The goal of this study is to characterize the aetiology of a group of infants born between 2010 and 2014 and evaluate the neurological outcome and comorbidities after a minimum of three years of follow-up.This is a retrospective study, with a descriptive analysis of the newborns with a minimum gestational age of 36 weeks that were submitted to a video-electroencephalogram (video-EEG) at the Paediatric Hospital from Centro Hospitalar e Universitário de Coimbra (HP/CHUC) during the neonatal period. The clinical processes were consulted using the software Sclinic®. In the cases in which there was no updated clinical information, a phone interview was performed based on a predetermined evaluation questionnaire.The variables analysed were: demographic data, risk factors, clinical presentation, aetiology, video-EEG results, neuroimaging exams, development profile and comorbidities, as well as the follow-up in hospital consults and rehabilitation programs.Thus, a sample with 82 cases was obtained with no significative difference pertaining the gender. The most common forms of presentation were HIE (59,8%), vascular (20,7%) and neurological malformations (8,5%).Only 11 cases had a normal video-EEG. Seven of the children were not submitted to a neuroimaging exam. From the rest of the group, only ten had an exam that was considered normal being the most common lesions encountered those involving the grey matter (n=33), and among those the most commonly affected structures were the basal ganglia (n=12).From the initial sample, in 64 cases there was a minimum of three years follow-up. Only 27 of those had a normal development profile at the age of three.Twenty-eight percent of cases developed cerebral palsy and twenty-two percent were later diagnosed with epilepsy. It was also discovered that four children who had neurological deficits were not involved in any rehabilitation program.In conclusion, neonatal encephalopathy is still associated with a great prevalence of neurologic deficits and comorbidities with a variable severity degree. It was also observed the lack of a systematic and universal method of follow-up of this group of patients which does not benefit their healthcare

O lago de todos os recursos : [homenagem a Hélio Osvaldo Alves]

O presente volume de estudos em homenagem ao Professor Hélio Osvaldo Alves é composto por duas partes. A primeira, com o título de ‘Testemunhos’, reúne as palavras com que amigos, colegas e discípulos recordaram a pessoa de Hélio Alves. A segunda parte, ‘Comunicações’, inclui os textos de carácter científico apresentados e debatidos no colóquio, realizado em Novembro de 2003. ‘O lago de todos os recursos’ é uma expressão que o Professor Hélio tomou de empréstimo a E. P. Thompson, e adaptou, para baptizar um dos seus estudos sobre a ideia de Cultura. Escolhemos esse título para o colóquio que deu origem a este volume por ele sugerir as infinitas possibilidades de estudo e análise que se contêm na palavra Cultura, bem como a diversidade de escolhas e aproximações que os estudos de Cultura proporcionam

Characterisation of microbial attack on archaeological bone

As part of an EU funded project to investigate the factors influencing bone preservation in the archaeological record, more than 250 bones from 41 archaeological sites in five countries spanning four climatic regions were studied for diagenetic alteration. Sites were selected to cover a range of environmental conditions and archaeological contexts. Microscopic and physical (mercury intrusion porosimetry) analyses of these bones revealed that the majority (68%) had suffered microbial attack. Furthermore, significant differences were found between animal and human bone in both the state of preservation and the type of microbial attack present. These differences in preservation might result from differences in early taphonomy of the bones. © 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved