Demographic, clinical and antibody characteristics of patients with digital ulcers in systemic sclerosis: data from the DUO Registry

OBJECTIVES: The Digital Ulcers Outcome (DUO) Registry was designed to describe the clinical and antibody characteristics, disease course and outcomes of patients with digital ulcers associated with systemic sclerosis (SSc). METHODS: The DUO Registry is a European, prospective, multicentre, observational, registry of SSc patients with ongoing digital ulcer disease, irrespective of treatment regimen. Data collected included demographics, SSc duration, SSc subset, internal organ manifestations, autoantibodies, previous and ongoing interventions and complications related to digital ulcers. RESULTS: Up to 19 November 2010 a total of 2439 patients had enrolled into the registry. Most were classified as either limited cutaneous SSc (lcSSc; 52.2%) or diffuse cutaneous SSc (dcSSc; 36.9%). Digital ulcers developed earlier in patients with dcSSc compared with lcSSc. Almost all patients (95.7%) tested positive for antinuclear antibodies, 45.2% for anti-scleroderma-70 and 43.6% for anticentromere antibodies (ACA). The first digital ulcer in the anti-scleroderma-70-positive patient cohort occurred approximately 5 years earlier than the ACA-positive patient group. CONCLUSIONS: This study provides data from a large cohort of SSc patients with a history of digital ulcers. The early occurrence and high frequency of digital ulcer complications are especially seen in patients with dcSSc and/or anti-scleroderma-70 antibodies

In vitro fermentation of diets incorporating carob pulp using inoculum from rabbit caecum

The aim of this work was to evaluate the nutritive value of carob pulp for rabbits using the in vitro digestibility and gas production techniques with inocula from caecal content of rabbits. Experimental diets contained 0% (D1), 10% (D2), 20% (D3) and 100% (D4) carob pulp on a dry matter (DM) basis and were incubated in glass syringes for 72 h at 39ºC. Carob pulp contained 313 g neutral detergent fibre/kg DM with a high acid detergent fibre (263 g/kg DM) content, resulting in a low hemicellulose content of 50 g/kg DM. Potential gas production ranged from 123 (D1) to 179 (D4) mL/g DM and was similar for the D1 (123 mL/g DM), D2 (126 mL/g DM) and D3 (130 mL/g DM) treatments. The lowest pH value of 6.47 and the highest organic matter degradation (OMD, 64.3%) were observed in the 100% carob pulp (D4) treatment, while its inclusion at 10% and 20% tended to improve the OMD of the diets. These results show that carob pulp is well fermented by the caecal micro-organisms of rabbits. Although its inclusion at 20% did not improve in vitro fermentation and degradation of the commercial concentrate, it was concluded that carob pulp has potential as an unconventional feed resource for rabbits. Its utilization could have a positive effect on intestinal microbiota owing to its high content of soluble fibre.Keywords: Ceratonia siliqua, by-product, chemical composition, gas production, organic matter degradatio

Production of medicinal plants in agroforestry systems (PA)

The medicinal and aromatic plants (MAPs) are a resource highly demanded at present, since to the typical uses of the medicinal and aromatic plants (in pharmacy, herbal medicine, condiments, perfumery, alcoholic beverages) were expanded between end of 1990 and early 2000 to new ones that increasingly have a greater weight in the global estimation of the use of this type of goods. This is the case of dermocosmetics, in which plant extracts appear more frequently, or the development and commercialization of beverages and functional foods that contain bioactive compounds from medicinal plants. In addition, in recent years the demand for natural products for the care of domestic animals has been intensified. Only in the United States the market volume of this type of products was one billion dollars in 2002. The figures that are reflected in the bibliography on both the total volume of plants that move in the PAM market and the money that generates this type of products worldwide are very high. The global average of imports each year exceeds 400,000 tons of medicinal and aromatic plants