The MHC2TA -168A>G gene polymorphism is not associated with rheumatoid arthritis in Austrian patients

An association between susceptibility to rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and a common -168A>G polymorphism in the MHC2TA gene with differential major histocompatibility complex (MHC) II molecule expression was recently reported in a Swedish population. The objective of the present study was to replicate this finding by examining the -168A>G polymorphism in an Austrian case–control study. Three hundred and sixty-two unrelated RA cases and 351 sex-matched and age-matched controls as well as 1,709 Austrian healthy individuals were genotyped. All participants were from the same ethnic background. Genotyping was performed using 5' allelic discrimination assays. The association between susceptibility to RA and the -168A>G single nucleotide polymorphism was examined by chi-square test. Comparison was made assuming a dominant effect (AG + GG genotypes versus AA genotype). In contrast to the primary report, the frequency of MHC2TA -168G allele carriers was not significantly different between patients and controls in the Austrian cohort. The homozygous MHC2TA -168 GG genotype was more frequent in matched controls than in Austrian RA patients. There was no association between the presence of RA-specific autoantibodies and the MHC2TA -168 GG genotype. In this cohort of Austrian patients, no association between the MHC2TA polymorphism and RA was found

Clinical and Operative Determinants of Acute Kidney Injury after Cardiac Surgery.

Introduction: Cardiac surgery-associated acute kidney injury (CSA-AKI) is associated with increased morbidity and mortality. Objectives: We aimed to identify potentially modifiable risk factors for CSA-AKI. Methods: This was asingle-center retrospective cohort study of 495 adult patients undergoing cardiac surgery. AKI was diagnosed and staged using full KDIGO criteria incorporating baseline serum creatinine (SC) levels and correction of postoperative SC levels for fluid balance. We examined the association of routinely available clinical and laboratory data with AKI using multivariate logistic regression modeling. Results: A total of 103 (20.8%) patients developed AKI: 16 (15.5%) patients were diagnosed with AKI upon hospital admission, and 87 (84.5%) patients were diagnosed with CSA-AKI. Correction of SC levels for fluid balance increased the number of AKI cases to 104 (21.0%), with 6 patients categorized to different AKI stages. Univariate logistic regression analysis identified five preoperative (age, sex, diabetes mellitus, preoperative systolic pulmonary arterial pressure [PSPAP], acute decompensated heart failure) and five intraoperative predictors of AKI (age, sex, red blood cell [RBC] volume transfused, use of minimally invasive surgery, duration of cardiopulmonary bypass). When all preoperative and intraoperative variables were incorporated into one model, six predictors remained significant (age, sex, use of minimally invasive surgery, RBC volume transfused, PSPAP, duration of cardiopulmonary bypass). Model discrimination performance showed an area under the curve of 0.69 for the model including only preoperative variables, 0.76 for the model including only intraoperative variables, and 0.77 for the model including all preoperative and intraoperative variables. Conclusions: Use of minimally invasive surgery and therapies mitigating PSPAP and intraoperative blood loss may offer protection against CSA-AKI

Blood pressure and Mortality in the 4D Study

Introduction: Systolic (SBP), diastolic (DBP) and mean arterial pressure (MAP) are risk factors for cardiovascular mortality (CVM). Pulse pressure (PP) is an easily available parameter of vascular stiffness, but its impact on CVM in chronic dialysis patients with diabetes is unclear. Methods: Therefore, we have examined the predictive value of baseline, predialytic PP, SBP, DBP and MAP in the German Diabetes and Dialysis (4D) study, a prospective, randomized, double-blind trial enrolling 1255 patients with type 2 diabetes on hemodialysis in 178 German dialysis centers. Results: Mean age was 66.3 years, mean blood pressure 146/76 mmHg, mean time suffering from diabetes 18.1 years and mean time on maintenance dialysis 8.3 months. Considered as continuous variables, PP, MAP, SBP and DBP could not provide a significant mortality prediction for either cardiovascular or all-cause mortality. After dividing the cohort into corresponding tertiles, we did also not detect any significant mortality prediction for PP, SBP, DBP or MAP, both for all-cause mortality and CVM after adjusting for age and sex. Nevertheless, when comparing the HR plots of the corresponding blood pressure parameters, a pronounced U-curve was seen for PP for both all-cause mortality and CVM, with the trough range being 70-80 mmHg. Discussion: In patients with end-stage renal disease and long-lasting diabetes mellitus predialytic blood pressure parameters at study entry are not predictive for mortality, presumably because there is a very high rate of competing mortality risk factors, resulting in overall very high rates of all-cause and cardiovascular mortality, that may no longer be significantly modulated by blood pressure control

B Cells and T Cells Abnormalities in Patients With Selective IgA Deficiency

BACKGROUND: Selective IgA deficiency (SIgAD) is the most prevalent inborn errors of immunity with almost unknown etiology. This study aimed to investigate the clinical diagnostic and prognostic values of lymphocyte subsets and function in symptomatic SIgAD patients. METHODS: A total of 30 available SIgAD patients from the Iranian registry and 30 age-sex-matched healthy controls were included in the present study. We analyzed B and T cell peripheral subsets and T cell proliferation assay by flow cytometry in SIgAD patients with mild and severe clinical phenotypes. RESULTS: Our results indicated a significant increase in naïve and transitional B cells and a strong decrease in marginal zone-like and switched memory B-cells in SIgAD patients. We found that naïve and central memory CD4 CONCLUSION: SIgAD patients have varied cellular and humoral deficiencies. Therefore, T cell and B cell assessment might help in better understanding the heterogeneous pathogenesis and prognosis estimation of the disease

A cognitive perspective on basic generic metaphors and their specific-level realizations

By conducting an examination of the mapping process in metaphor comprehension, this article suggests that a set of superficially different metaphors can be considered to be isomorphic to an underlying generic metaphor. In other words, a set of seemingly different metaphors with different domains can be categorized under a single generic metaphor. The generic metaphor is in the general form of X is in some kind of semantic relationship with Y. When this generic metaphor is realized in specific-level forms, a number of metaphors are produced which are isomorphic to each other, although their domains could be completely different in appearance. In other words, there is a deep homogeneity among a set of concretely different metaphors. A generic metaphor can be seen as a semantic frame for all specific metaphors that are isomorphic to it. Since base and target domains of a given metaphor can be very different in terms of concrete features, the mapping of the base into the target must be mediated by the domain of its underlying generic metaphor

Alterations in echocardiographic left ventricular function after percutaneous coronary stenting in diabetic patients with isolated severe proximal left anterior descending artery stenosis

Background: There are conflicting theories regarding the use of percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) of isolated severe proximal left anterior descending (LAD) artery stenosis in place of left internal mammary artery grafting in diabetic patients. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of PCI on left ventricular function and determine difference between diabetics and non-diabetics. Methods: A prospective study was conducted on 50 patients with isolated severe proximal LAD stenosis: 23 diabetic and 27 non-diabetic patients. Successful PCI with everolimus-eluting stents was performed for all of the patients. These patients underwent transthoracic echocardiography within 24 h before and 1 month after PCI, and alterations in the left ventricular parameters were compared between the two groups. Results: There was a significant 12% increment in the mitral annular peak systolic velocity (s′) (p = 0.02), 21% decrement in the trans mitral early filling deceleration time (DT) (p < 0.001), 10% decrement in the systolic left ventricular internal dimension (LVIDs) (p = 0.002), significant increment in the left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) (p = 0.004), and significant decrement in the left atrial diameter (p = 0.006) in the diabetic patients after performing PCI. Conversely, the non-diabetic patients showed a statistically significant 14% increase in the DT, 6.3% decrease in the s′ velocity, 8% increase in the LVIDs, significant increment in the left atrial diameter and no change in LVEF after PCI. Conclusion: Our study demonstrated that everolimus-eluting stents favorably improved the markers of left ventricular systolic and diastolic function in diabetic patients with isolated severe proximal LAD stenosis compared with those of non-diabetic patients with the same condition

The Role of IT Identity in Self-disclosure Behavior on Social Networking Sites

As people use social networking sites more than ever before, disclosing personal information continues to be an issue of increasing concern both for practice and research. In spite of existing privacy concerns, people paradoxically continue to disclose personal information. IS literature has provided partial explanations for this paradox. However, recent studies have recommended the consideration of spontaneous privacy-related behaviors. The emerging research on IT identity (ITID) – the extent to which an individual views use of an IT as integral to his or her sense of self – has opened a new window on better explaining IT use behaviors. This proposed study aims to explain the role of IT identity in self-disclosing behavior of social networking sites (SNS) users. This study contributes to the research by (a) providing a better explanation of privacy paradox phenomenon and (b) considering the role of ITID in predicting privacy-related behaviors