Biomarkers in immunonutrition programme, is there still a need for new ones? A brief review

Peer reviewedPublisher PD

The place of S-ketamine in fibromyalgia treatment (ESKEFIB): study protocol for a prospective, single-center, double-blind, randomized, parallel-group, dose-escalation controlled trial

Background: Fibromyalgia is a chronic multidimensional pain disease with no curative treatment currently available. Its management relies on a multimodal approach involving pharmacologic and non-pharmacologic elements. Because a suggested factor in its etiology is a central sensitization phenomenon involving the N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR), NMDAR antagonists have been proposed as a treatment target. Ketamine and its levogyre form, S-ketamine, have been used to treat chronic pain for many years without consensus about their therapeutic efficiency. We aim to assess the efficacy of S-ketamine as a co-treatment for fibromyalgia. Methods: This prospective, randomized, single-center, double-blind, parallel-group, dose-escalation trial will compare a co-treatment with S-ketamine (intervention) to a control treatment without S-ketamine (control). It will consist of two successive cohorts with 2:1 randomization ratio (S-ketamine at two different doses: control) with 105 participants in each cohort. The protocol follow-up time will be 12 weeks, including 3 visits for the treatment (week 0, week 2, and week 4) and 3 visits for follow-up (week 6, week 9, and week 12). Our primary outcome, pain relief and/or better patient function, will be assessed with the Brief Pain Inventory questionnaire. The statistical analysis will be performed on an intention-to-treat basis. If the primary outcome is reached at the end of follow-up in the first cohort with low-dose S-ketamine (0.2 mg/kg), the trial will end. If not, the trial will continue with the second cohort and high-dose S-ketamine (0.4 mg/kg). Discussion: The challenge of our trial is the inclusion of a large number of participants in comparison to other trials involving ketamine or S-ketamine infusions for chronic pain management. The originality of our protocol is to include functionality in addition to pain relief as a primary outcome because these two endpoints are not linked in a linear way. For some patients, functional status is more important than pain relief. Trial registration: EudraCT reference: 2020-000473-25, ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT04436250, first posted June 18, 2020; last updated July 21, 2020. Protocol version 2.2 issued on September 30, 2020, after a revision by the ethics committee. https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04436250SCOPUS: ar.jinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishe

Goat endothelial cells may be infected in vitro by transmigration of caprine arthritis-encephalitis virus-infected leucocytes

International audienceThe caprine arthritis-encephalitis lentivirus (CAEV) causes a lifelong persistent infection in goats, and induces infiltrations of leucocytes and tissue reorganization in target organs, with a cyclical pattern of viral expression. The mammary gland is an important site of infection, associated with mother-to-kid transmission by infected cells in colostrum and milk. The monocyte/ macrophage is the principal target cell, but other cell types, including epithelial and endothelial cells and fibroblasts, are susceptible to in vitro infection with varying levels of viral replication. Such cells, perhaps at specific differentiation states, might play a role in the regulation and transfer of in vivo infection in target organs. In this paper we describe the in vitro infection of endothelial cell monolayers by the transmigration of monocytes carrying the CAEV provirus. The infected endothelial cells progress to expression of the viral p30 capsid antigen, suggesting viral proliferation. Such a process occurring in vivo during angiogenesis and leucocyte homing to the mammary gland in the final third of mammogenesis, might contribute to viral spread in this crucial target organ

Le Récit d'enfance et ses modèles

L’idée que le récit d’enfance puisse avoir des modèles, être objet d’imitations, donner lieu à des formules codifiées et à des séries, semble paradoxale : la relation du début de la vie n’est-elle pas considérée comme l’occasion d’affirmer la singularité de la personne et de mettre au jour ce qu’il y a de plus intime dans une existence ? N’est-ce pas en particulier le récit d’enfance qui distingue le récit autobiographique centré sur le caractère privé, unique de la vie, des mémoires qui présentent un personnage public, un témoin qui fait de ce qu’il a vécu le point d’appui d’un point de vue sur l’Histoire ? Parce que cette frontière paraît mouvante, on préfère cependant aujourd’hui parler de « récits de vie ». Les recherches sur les mémoires et les autobiographies spirituelles ont souligné la présence de formes de récits d’enfance et d’une topique de l’évocation des origines de la vie, avant les Confessions de Rousseau, ouvrage qui marquerait la naissance du genre autobiographique. Les travaux sur les modèles fictionnels à l’œuvre dans le récit factuel, sur l’intertextualité, sur le genre contemporain de l’autofiction, la notion définie par Maurice Halbwachs de mémoire collective amènent à s’interroger sur la présence d’une mémoire des représentations et des textes qui imprègne toute écriture de la mémoire. Enfin, la popularité croissante de la pratique du récit de vie par des auteurs qui n’appartiennent pas au monde institutionnel des lettres invite à considérer aussi la question du savoir-faire, des recettes et des conseils dans la façon de raconter son enfance. Ce colloque a été conçu pour faire le point, dans les écrits de langue française, sur cette relation entre le récit d’une expérience unique et des formes reproduites et reproductibles