The role of platelet indices in ischemic heart disease: a hospital based case control type of study

Background: In developing countries, Ischemic heart diseases (IHD) is one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality. The underlying pathology of CAD is atherosclerosis. When this atherosclerotic plaque ruptures, platelets play a crucial role in the prothrombotic events and forms a thrombus on this plaque and as a result coronary artery gets occluded causing ischemia and infarction. Platelet contains many chemokines, cytokines and growth factors. Release of these factors along with interaction with endothelial cells and leukocytes promotes inflammation and progression of atherosclerosis. We aimed to investigate the association between platelet volume indices in patients with diagnosis of Ischemic heart disease in comparison with control group.Methods: By using automated cell counter platelet count and platelet volume indices - were compared with Normal healthy or non-cardiac chest pain patients with the use of unpaired t test.Results: In the present study, we demonstrated that platelet count is significantly low and MPV and PDW are significantly high in Ischemic heart disease as compared to patients with noncardiac chest pain or healthy subjects. The correlation of MPV with PC revealed an inverse correlation between the patients of IHD and healthy or non-cardiac chest pain patients which is statistically significant.Conclusions: The platelet volume indices are an important, simple, effortless and a cost-effective tool useful in predicting the development of an acute coronary event sometimes in the near future and therapeutic modification for improved patient’s cardiovascular care

Cytopathological study of salivary gland lesions by fine needle aspiration cytology

Background: Fine needle aspiration cytology is an inexpensive, minimally invasive, outpatient diagnostic procedure. FNA of salivary gland is easier to perform as the site is superficial and repeat FNAC can be perform. As compared to biopsy methods, FNA is a very smooth, cheaper, outpatient procedure helping clinician to save his time for earlier diagnosis and treatment. Though anatomical structure of the gland is very simple, it is subjected to a diverse and heterogenous range of tumors.Methods: The present study on “Cytomorphological features of salivary gland lesion by FNAC” was carried out on department of pathology from June 2015 to June 2017. 65 patients with salivary gland lesions who were sent to pathology department for FNAC were aspirated and correlated histopathologically.Results: Benign salivary gland lesions contribute to majority of cases (54%). Pleomorphic Adenoma was the most common benign salivary gland lesions and Mucoepidermoid Carcinoma was most common malignant lesion. Parotid gland was the most commonly involved in benign tumors and submandibular gland was commonly involved by malignant tumors. Commonly affected age group by benign salivary gland lesion was 31-40 years and those with malignant salivary gland lesion was 41-50 years.Conclusions: FNA cytology provides useful information for the management of salivary gland lesions and prevents unnecessary surgery in cases of nonneoplastic lesions and identification of malignancy helps the surgeon in deciding type and extent of surgery

Herbal used as Epigenetic for Cancer Treatment

Patterns of chromatin accessibility, which are in turn altered by epigenetic mechanisms, are responsible for determining the interactions that take place between transcription machinery, genes, and the cis-regulatory elements of those genes. Mutations that interfere with epigenetic processes frequently have the unfortunate side effect of causing cancer. Since these mutations can be undone, numerous anticancer treatments that target epigenetic pathways are now being developed and evaluated. (Cancer) is becoming more and more common everywhere. This decline in clinical outcomes is a result of a number of factors, including late diagnosis, a lack of efficient treatments for particular cancer subtypes, and drug resistance. Treatment resistance and stemness traits have been recognised as markers of this disease, and it has been demonstrated that epigenetic changes play a role in the process of cancer growth. Understanding these alterations and how they impact cancer carcinogenesis treatment is challenging but crucial. However, it may be able to provide the special knowledge needed to use these alterations as potential diagnostic, prognostic, therapeutic agents, and predictors of treatment efficacy. This underlines the importance of continued research to advance our knowledge of cancer carcinogenesis and epigenetics and help us overcome these challenges. This review aims to provide an overview of the state of the art in epigenetics research for cancer detection and treatment and to stimulate discussion on this subject

Recasting Food: An Ethnographic Study on How Caste and Resource Inequality Perpetuate Social Disadvantage in India

Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) is the principal programme operating in India to address issues around child development, malnutrition and pre-school education. A package of services – including the Supplementary Nutrition Programme (SNP), pre-school education, immunization, health check-ups, referral services, and nutrition and health education – are provided through an Anganwadi Centre (AWC) with an Anganwadi Worker (AWW) and an Anganwadi Helper (AWH) for roughly every one thousand people. From the mid-1990s, there have been successive efforts on the part of the Government of India to universalize ICDS, and there has been a multi-fold increase in funds allocated to this programme between the 8th Five-Year Plan (1992–93 to 1996–97) and the 12th Five-Year Plan (2012–17) (1-2). However, the utilization of all services under ICDS continues to be grossly low. Close to 75 percent of children aged 0–71 months in the areas covered by AWCs did not receive any supplementary food from the centres, and less than 12 percent of children received supplementary food ‘almost daily’. For children aged 36–71 months this figure is 15.5 percent. More than 80 percent of children were not weighed at all. It has been reported that children belonging to economically backward and socially marginalised families, including Dalit, tribal, and religious minorities, are excluded from utilising these services through unfavourable institutional rules and structural factors. Equally, members of well-off families do not use services provided by AWCs – especially the SNP – for under-6 children. A multi-sited ethnographic study was conducted in four villages in Gujarat in order to identify the reasons behind poor utilisation of AWCs, especially the SNP services. The study aimed to understand everyday experience of households around the SNP in rural settings and an opportunity to study AWCs as institutions embedded in the context of village cultural life. The authors hypothesise that a study focusing on AWCs could serve as an illustrative case to highlight challenges in implementing other entitlement-based programmes

A rare case of multilocular cystic renal neoplasm of low malignant potential diagnosed on intra-operative fine needle aspiration cytology

Multi-locular Cystic Renal Cell Carcinoma (MCRCC) is now considered as Multilocular cystic renal neoplasm of low malignant potential (MCRNLMP) in World health organisation classification (WHO) 2016. It is usually seen in elderly people where it can mimic most of the time as benign cystic lesion. Authors are reporting a case of MCRNLMP in a 70 year male diagnosed intraoperative with the help of Fine Needle Aspiration Cytology (FNAC). Radiological and other clinical findings are in favour of cystic renal lesion. And it is very important to differentiate it from conventional renal cell carcinoma which requires radical nephrectomy. So, radiological finding and FNAC is instrumental in diagnosing this rare case which require different mode of surgical management

Acinic cell carcinoma, papillary-cystic variant: a rare case diagnosed in fine needle aspiration cytology

Acinic Cell Carcinoma is a rarest malignant epithelial neoplasm arising from pleuripotent stem cells. ACC constitute 6% of all salivary gland tumor. Most common site is parotid. It is slowly growing tumor with female preponderance most commonly occur during fifth and sixth decades of life. Diagnosis by imaging study are complex, but USG is helpful in evaluating tumor. We are presenting a 9year female, complaint of a painless, freely movable, atraumatic swelling on left cheek measuring 2x1cm2, slowly enlarging since, 8 months. FNAC was performed from the swelling and routine stain (H and E, MGG, Pap) and special stain (PAS) was performed. On cytological smears, overall findings are suggestive of papillary-cystic variant of ACC which is difficult to diagnosed in cytology. PAS stain showed positivity for both intra-cytoplasmic granules and extra-cellular secretions. ACC is a slowly growing multi-potent malignant salivary gland tumor. Management is with surgery

Stemness, Pluripotentiality, and Wnt Antagonism: sFRP4, a Wnt antagonist Mediates Pluripotency and Stemness in Glioblastoma

Background: Chemotherapeutic resistance of glioblastoma has been attributed to a self-renewing subpopulation, the glioma stem cells (GSCs), which is known to be maintained by the Wnt β−catenin pathway. Our previous findings demonstrated that exogeneous addition of the Wnt antagonist, secreted fizzled-related protein 4 (sFRP4) hampered stem cell properties in GSCs. Methods: To understand the molecular mechanism of sFRP4, we overexpressed sFRP4 (sFRP4 OE) in three human glioblastoma cell lines U87MG, U138MG, and U373MG. We also performed chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) sequencing of sFRP4 OE and RNA sequencing of sFRP4 OE and sFRP4 knocked down U87 cells. Results: We observed nuclear localization of sFRP4, suggesting an unknown nuclear role. ChIP-sequencing of sFRP4 pulldown DNA revealed a homeobox Cphx1, related to the senescence regulator ETS proto-oncogene 2 (ETS2). Furthermore, miRNA885, a p53-mediated apoptosis inducer, was upregulated in sFRP4 OE cells. RNA sequencing analysis suggested that sFRP4-mediated apoptosis is via the Fas-p53 pathway by activating the Wnt calcium and reactive oxygen species pathways. Interestingly, sFRP4 OE cells had decreased stemness, but when knocked down in multipotent mesenchymal stem cells, pluripotentiality was induced and the Wnt β-catenin pathway was upregulated. Conclusions: This study unveils a novel nuclear role for sFRP4 to promote apoptosis by a possible activation of DNA damage machinery in glioblastoma

An Overview of Ovarian Cancer: The Role of Cancer Stem Cells in Chemoresistance and a Precision Medicine Approach Targeting the Wnt Pathway with the Antagonist sFRP4

Ovarian cancer is one of the most prevalent gynecological cancers, having a relatively high fatality rate with a low five-year chance of survival when detected in late stages. The early detection, treatment and prevention of metastasis is pertinent and a pressing research priority as many patients are diagnosed only in stage three of ovarian cancer. Despite surgical interventions, targeted immunotherapy and adjuvant chemotherapy, relapses are significantly higher than other cancers, suggesting the dire need to identify the root cause of metastasis and relapse and present more precise therapeutic options. In this review, we first describe types of ovarian cancers, the existing markers and treatment modalities. As ovarian cancer is driven and sustained by an elusive and highly chemoresistant population of cancer stem cells (CSCs), their role and the associated signature markers are exhaustively discussed. Non-invasive diagnostic markers, which can be identified early in the disease using circulating tumor cells (CTCs), are also described. The mechanism of the self-renewal, chemoresistance and metastasis of ovarian CSCs is regulated by the Wnt signaling pathway. Thus, its role in ovarian cancer in promoting stemness and metastasis is delineated. Based on our findings, we propose a novel strategy of Wnt inhibition using a well-known Wnt antagonist, secreted frizzled related protein 4 (sFRP4), wherein short micropeptides derived from the whole protein can be used as powerful inhibitors. The latest approaches to early diagnosis and novel treatment strategies emphasized in this review will help design precision medicine approaches for an effective capture and destruction of highly aggressive ovarian cancer

Biochemical composition, oil profiling and elemental analysis of different cumin (Cuminum cyminum) genotypes

Cumin (Cuminum cyminum L.) is an annual plant of the family Apiaceae and the genus Cuminum has a single species Cyminum, native from the east Mediterranean to east India. In India, Gujarat and Rajasthan are only the major producing state. After black pepper, cumin is the second most popular spice in the world, considering the rich source of various nutritional qualities. Therefore, the present research work was carried out to observe nutritional quality parameters, oil profiling and element analysis from fifteen cumin genotypes/varieties. The moisture content was found to vary from 6.22 to 8.15 %. The carbohydrate content was reported higher in Kushalpura-1 (46.14 %), while the crude protein in genotypes Indawar was maximum followed by GC-2 and Merta-2. True protein content was observed higher in Lampolai (18.24 %) and lower in GC-2 (11.36 %). In Lamba Jatan, higher content of non-reducing sugar (8.35 %) and total soluble sugar (9.11 %) were found. Reducing sugar was detected in the range of 0.72 – 1.53 %. Higher amount of total free amino acids and crude fiber were found in Gawardi and Kushalpura-1, respectively. The total oil (20.27 %) and volatile oil (3.99 %) content was found highest in GC-4. The petroselinic acid and linoleic acid were observed as primary fatty acids in all tested genotypes. However, Lampolai, Merta-1, GC-2 and GC-4 were good sources of both fatty acids among all genotypes. The elemental analysis showed that the GC-2 has an overall high amount of macronutrients, while micronutrients was highest in Piplon-5. However, Merta-1 having a lower amount of toxic elements as compared to the rest of the genotypes

Pharmacological evaluation of some synthesized thiazolidinone derivatives containing Mannich base of sydnone and p-phenylenediamine

A series of 4-thiazolidinone derivatives incorporating Mannich base of 3-(3-nitrophenyl)sydnone have been synthesized by conventional routes and evaluated for their antimicrobial activities against E. coli, P. aerugenosa, S. aureus, S. pyogenus, C. albicans, A. niger and A. clavatus. Most of the compounds show moderate to very good biological activity. The structures of synthesized compounds 7a-j have been elucidated by C, H, and N analysis, FT-IR, 1H and 13C NMR and mass spectrometry