A new semiquantitative culture method for early detection of surgical incisional wound infection

A semiquantitative culture technique for early detection of surgical wound infection was done by rolling a segment of a plastic intravenous catheter across a blood agar plate after insertion into the most inflamed part of the wound on postoperative day 3. Patients were monitored daily for purulent discharge until healing. Of the 53 wounds studied, 44 (83%) had no growth or low-density superficial colonization on the blood agar (generally 15 colony-forming units and a diffuse subcutaneous pattern (colonies below the upper 1.5 cm of the catheter), all developed purulent discharge with a positive culture of the same organisms found by semiquantitative culture. This result differed significantly (P < .01) from the 44 wounds without subsequent infection. This semiquantitative technique has the potential to distinguish infection from colonization and may be useful in diagnosing surgical wound infection.published_or_final_versio

Concomitant plasmacytoma and B cell lymphoma with discordant light chain expression but clonal identity

Letter to the editorpublished_or_final_versionSpringer Open Choice, 25 May 201

An Outlook Add-in for managing of users' circulation records

HKU Libraries has created this new Outlook add-in to automatically update your Outlook Calendar with HKUL events, Circulation due dates and pickup dates. Please note that Outlook has long had the ability to hotsync and update calendars in portable devices such as Palm, PocketPC, Smartphone, and iPod. Therefore, once this new add-in is installed in Outlook, and if hotsyncing is set up on your PC, HKUL dates will also appear in the calendars of your portable devices.published_or_final_versio

Comparative evaluation of a point-of-care immunochromatographic test SNAP 4Dx with molecular detection tests for vector-borne canine pathogens in Hong Kong

There are no comprehensive studies on the performance of commonly used point-of-care diagnostic enzyme immunoassay for common arthropod-borne canine pathogens. A comparative evaluation of an immunochromatographic test for these infections with a comprehensive polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test panel was performed on 100 pet dogs and 100 stray dogs without obvious clinical symptoms. Of the 162 positive test results from both immunochromatographic test and PCR, there was 85.2% concordance. The 24 discordant results between serology and PCR occurred in tests involving Ehrlichia canis (14) and Anaplasma platys (10), which may be related to the time of infection. No positive cases of borreliosis or rickettsiosis were detected. One important limitation of the immunochromatographic test was its lack of testing for babesiosis and hepatozoonosis. The former is the most prevalent arthropod-borne canine infection in our cohort (41%). Coinfections were found in 19% stray dogs and 6% of pet dogs with both tests (p<0.01). Seventeen and 8 samples from stray and pet dogs, respectively, were initially positive in the PCR test for Ehrlichia. However, on sequencing of the PCR amplicon, 10 from stray and 2 from pet dogs were found to be Wolbachia sequences instead, with 100% nucleotide identity to the 16S rRNA sequence of Wolbachia endosymbiont of Dirofilaria immitis. The presence of Wolbachia DNAemia (6%) correlated well with the molecular test and immunochromatographic antigen test for D. immitis. © Copyright 2011, Mary Ann Liebert, Inc.published_or_final_versio

A novel psittacine adenovirus identified during an outbreak of avian chlamydiosis and human psittacosis: zoonosis associated with virus-bacterium coinfection in birds

Chlamydophila psittaci is found worldwide, but is particularly common among psittacine birds in tropical and subtropical regions. While investigating a human psittacosis outbreak that was associated with avian chlamydiosis in Hong Kong, we identified a novel adenovirus in epidemiologically linked Mealy Parrots, which was not present in healthy birds unrelated to the outbreak or in other animals. The novel adenovirus (tentatively named Psittacine adenovirus HKU1) was most closely related to Duck adenovirus A in the Atadenovirus genus. Sequencing showed that the Psittacine adenovirus HKU1 genome consists of 31,735 nucleotides. Comparative genome analysis showed that the Psittacine adenovirus HKU1 genome contains 23 open reading frames (ORFs) with sequence similarity to known adenoviral genes, and six additional ORFs at the 3′ end of the genome. Similar to Duck adenovirus A, the novel adenovirus lacks LH1, LH2 and LH3, which distinguishes it from other viruses in the Atadenovirus genus. Notably, fiber-2 protein, which is present in Aviadenovirus but not Atadenovirus, is also present in Psittacine adenovirus HKU1. Psittacine adenovirus HKU1 had pairwise amino acid sequence identities of 50.3–54.0% for the DNA polymerase, 64.6–70.7% for the penton protein, and 66.1–74.0% for the hexon protein with other Atadenovirus. The C. psittaci bacterial load was positively correlated with adenovirus viral load in the lung. Immunostaining for fiber protein expression was positive in lung and liver tissue cells of affected parrots, confirming active viral replication. No other viruses were found. This is the first documentation of an adenovirus-C. psittaci co-infection in an avian species that was associated with a human outbreak of psittacosis. Viral-bacterial co-infection often increases disease severity in both humans and animals. The role of viral-bacterial co-infection in animal-to-human transmission of infectious agents has not received sufficient attention and should be emphasized in the investigation of disease outbreaks in human and animals. © 2014 To et al.published_or_final_versio

High Diversity of Genogroup I Picobirnaviruses in Mammals

published_or_final_versio

Vaccinia-related kinase 1 promotes hepatocellular carcinoma by controlling the levels of cell cycle regulators associated with G1/S transition

We identified the specific role of vaccinia-related kinase 1 (VRK1) in the progression of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and evaluated its therapeutic and prognostic potential. VRK1 levels were significantly higher in HCC cell lines than a normal hepatic cell line, and were higher in HCC than non-tumor tissue. VRK1 knockdown inhibited the proliferation of SK-Hep1, SH-J1 and Hep3B cells; moreover, depletion of VRK1 suppressed HCC tumor growth in vivo. We also showed that VRK1 knockdown increased the number of G1 arrested cells by decreasing cyclin D1 and p-Rb while upregulating p21 and p27, and that VRK1 depletion downregulated phosphorylation of CREB, a transcription factor regulating CCND1. Additionally, we found that luteolin, a VRK1 inhibitor, suppressed HCC growth in vitro and in vivo, and that the aberrant VRK1 expression correlated with poor prognostic features of HCC. High levels of VRK1 were associated with shorter overall and disease-free survival and higher recurrence rates. Taken together, our findings suggest VRK1 may act as a tumor promoter by controlling the level of cell cycle regulators associated with G1/S transition and could potentially serve as a therapeutic target and/or prognostic biomarker for HCC.1110Ysciescopu