A prospective observational study of dengue fever with thrombocytopenia with reference to treatment

Background: Dengue fever is treated according to the WHO guidelines worldwide but due to the unavailability of blood products and economic constraints treating physicians often modify according to the patients requirements and try to give best available treatment for the patients. So we did an observational study of dengue fever and evaluated the clinical profiles and prognosis of dengue fever with reference to the treatment in JSS Medical College, Mysore in south India, a tertiary medical centre.Methods: This two year prospective, observational study was conducted in JSS Medical College. A total of 128 patients were evaluated and were divided into three groups like group 1-mild risk, group 2-moderate risk and group 3-high risk depending on the platelet count levels and bleeding diathesis. Group 1 received supportive treatment, group 2 received supportive treatment and steroids (Inj dexamethasone 4mg IV q8h) and group 3 received supportive treatment with steroids and platelet transfusion. Clinical evaluation and relevant investigations like blood culture; malarial parasites and febrile serology (acute and convalescent) were performed.Results: This observational study revealed that dengue fever can be managed symptomatically according WHO guidelines and platelet transfusion is done only when platelet count is less than 10000/cumm or in bleeding diathesis irrespective of platelet count.  Conclusions: Steroid usage alone or along with platelet transfusion had no effect on the platelet count or on the overall outcome of the patient.

Clinical profile and outcome of rodenticide poisoning in patients admitted to a tertiary care teaching hospital in Mysore, Karnataka, India

Background: Rodenticide poisoning is of the major types of poisoning prevalent in India. However this broad category consists of different type of compounds with different mechanisms of toxicity and variable mortality rates.Methods: This study was performed on all cases of rodenticide poisonings admitted to a tertiary care hospital in Mysore between May 2014 and April 2015. Study consisted of 64 subjects.Results: 31 subjects had consumed aluminium phosphide, 18 had consumed Yellow Phosphorus and 12 had consumed Zinc Phosphide while 3 patients had consumed bromadiolone. There were 13 mortalities among the study group out of which 9 were in aluminium phosphide group while 4 were in the yellow phosphorus group. There were no mortalities in cases who had consumed zinc phosphide and bromodiolone.Conclusions: Aluminium phosphide was the most common compound rodenticide consumed and it was associated with increased mortality as compared to other Rodenticide poison

Ultrasensitive Detection of Cancer Biomarkers in the Clinic by Use of a Nanostructured Microfluidic Array

Multiplexed biomarker protein detection holds unrealized promise for clinical cancer diagnostics due to lack of suitable measurement devices and lack of rigorously validated protein panels. Here we report an ultrasensitive electrochemical microfluidic array optimized to measure a four-protein panel of biomarker proteins, and we validate the protein panel for accurate oral cancer diagnostics. Unprecedented ultralow detection into the 5-50 fg.mL(-1) range was achieved for simultaneous measurement of proteins interleukin 6 (IL-6), IL-8, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), and VEGF-C in diluted serum. The immunoarray achieves high sensitivity in 50 min assays by using off-line protein capture by magnetic beads carrying 400 000 enzyme labels and similar to 100 000 antibodies. After capture of the proteins and washing to inhibit nonspecific binding, the beads are magnetically separated and injected into the array for selective capture by antibodies on eight nanostructured sensors. Good correlations with enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISA) for protein determinations in conditioned cancer cell media confirmed the accuracy of this approach. Normalized means of the four protein levels in 78 oral cancer patient serum samples and 49 controls gave clinical sensitivity of 89 and specificity of 98 for oral cancer detection, demonstrating high diagnostic utility. The low-cost, easily fabricated immunoarray provides a rapid Serum test for diagnosis and personalized therapy of oral cancer. The device is readily adaptable to clinical diagnostics of other cancers. This record was migrated from the OpenDepot repository service in June, 2017 before shutting down

Biomarker Discovery by Novel Sensors Based on Nanoproteomics Approaches

During the last years, proteomics has facilitated biomarker discovery by coupling high-throughput techniques with novel nanosensors. In the present review, we focus on the study of label-based and label-free detection systems, as well as nanotechnology approaches, indicating their advantages and applications in biomarker discovery. In addition, several disease biomarkers are shown in order to display the clinical importance of the improvement of sensitivity and selectivity by using nanoproteomics approaches as novel sensors

Biomaterial-Based Implantable Devices for Cancer Therapy

This review article focuses on the current local therapies mediated by implanted macroscaled biomaterials available or proposed for fighting cancer and also highlights the upcoming research in this field. Several authoritative review articles have collected and discussed the state-of-the-art as well as the advancements in using biomaterial-based micro- and nano-particle systems for drug delivery in cancer therapy. On the other hand, implantable biomaterial devices are emerging as highly versatile therapeutic platforms, which deserve an increased attention by the healthcare scientific community, as they are able to offer innovative, more effective and creative strategies against tumors. This review summarizes the current approaches which exploit biomaterial-based devices as implantable tools for locally administrating drugs and describes their specific medical applications, which mainly target resected brain tumors or brain metastases for the inaccessibility of conventional chemotherapies. Moreover, a special focus in this review is given to innovative approaches, such as combined delivery therapies, as well as to alternative approaches, such as scaffolds for gene therapy, cancer immunotherapy and metastatic cell capture, the later as promising future trends in implantable biomaterials for cancer applications

A self assembled monolayer based microfluidic sensor for urea detection

Urease (Urs) and glutamate dehydrogenase (GLDH) have been covalently co-immobilized onto a self-assembled monolayer (SAM) comprising of 10-carboxy-1-decanthiol (CDT) via EDC–NHS chemistry deposited onto one of the two patterned gold (Au) electrodes for estimation of urea using poly(dimethylsiloxane) based microfluidic channels (2 cm × 200 μm × 200 μm). The CDT/Au and Urs-GLDH/CDT/Au electrodes have been characterized using Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, contact angle (CA), atomic force microscopy (AFM) and electrochemical cyclic voltammetry (CV) techniques. The electrochemical response measurement of a Urs-GLDH/CDT/Au bioelectrode obtained as a function of urea concentration using CV yield linearity as 10 to 100 mg dl−1, detection limit as 9 mg dl−1 and high sensitivity as 7.5 μA mM−1 cm−2

Properties and customization of sensor materials for biomedical applications.

Low-power chemo- and biosensing devices capable of monitoring clinically important parameters in real time represent a great challenge in the analytical field as the issue of sensor calibration pertaining to keeping the response within an accurate calibration domain is particularly significant (1–4). Diagnostics, personal health, and related costs will also benefit from the introduction of sensors technology (5–7). In addition, with the introduction of Registration, Evaluation, Authorization, and Restriction of Chemical Substances (REACH) regulation, unraveling the cause–effect relationships in epidemiology studies will be of outmost importance to help establish reliable environmental policies aimed at protecting the health of individuals and communities (8–10). For instance, the effect of low concentration of toxic elements is seldom investigated as physicians do not have means to access the data (11)

Immunodiagnostics and immunosensor design

This work compiles information on the principles of diagnostic immunochemical methods and the recent advances in this field. It presents an overview of modern techniques for the production of diag- nostic antibodies, their modification with the aim of improving their diagnostic potency, the different types of immunochemical detection systems, and the increasing diagnostic applications for human health that include specific disease markers, individualized diagnosis of cancer subtypes, therapeutic and addictive drugs, food residues, and environmental contaminants. A special focus lies in novel developments of immu- nosensor techniques, promising approaches to miniaturized detection units and the associated microfluidic systems. The trends towards high-throughput systems, multiplexed analysis, and miniaturization of the diag- nostic tools are discussed. It is also made evident that progress in the last few years has largely relied on novel chemical approaches