ENERGY SAVING THERMAL AGGREGATES OF NEW GENERATION OF THE COMPANY TACHTECH

A brief description of the company TACHTECH is given

Capsule endoscopy - initial experience in the Czech Republic : A retrospective multi-centre study

Introduction: L'endoscopie par capsule (EC) utilisant le système Given Imaging, est disponible en République tchèque depuis fin 2002. Buts et méthodes: Le but de cette étude rétrospective a été d'évaluer l'expérience existante de la capsule endoscopique dans cinq centres de gastroentérologie de noire pays. Soixante dix-huit EC ont été colligées (de novembre 2003 à avril 2004) concernant 38 hommes et 40 femmes (âge moyen: 54 ans). L'EC était indiquée comme dernière étape dans l'algorithme diagnostique. Résultats: La totalité de l'intestin grêle a pu être investiguée dans 54 cas sur 78 (69 %). Les angiodysplasies ont été le plus fréquemment retrouvées (16 patients), puis la maladie de Crohn (8 patients) et enfin, les tumeurs du grêle (7). L'EC a été suivie d'un geste chirurgical chez 15 patients, d'une entéroscopie per opératoire chez 9 patients et un traitement médical a été initié ou modifié chez 26 patients. Une rétention de la capsule a été observée dans 5 cas (6 % et une impaction dans le grêle dans 3 cas); un échec technique a été rapporté dans 5 cas (6 %). Conclusion: L'EC est une méthode complémentaire qui n'entre pas en compétition avec les autres outils diagnostiques d'investigation du grêle. L'EC est particulièrement précieuse en cas de saignement GI obscur. Cependant, notre expérience reste jusqu'à présent, assez limitée

small bowel neoplasms in patients undergoing video capsule endoscopy: a multicenter european study

Background: small bowel (SB) tumors account for 1-3% of all GI neoplasms. Recent studies with video capsule endoscopy (VCE) suggest that the frequency of these tumors may be substantially higher than previusly reported.Aim of the study: to evaluate frequency, clinical presentation, diagnostic/therapeutic work-up and endoscopic appearance of SB tumors in a large population of patients undergoing VCE.Methods: identification by specific questionnaire of all patients with VCE findings suggesting SB tumors and histological confirmation of the neoplasm seen in 29 centers of 10 European counries Results:124/5129 patients undergoing VCE (2.4%) had SB tumors (112 primitive,12 metastatic).Indication for VCE: obscure GI bleeding (108 patients), abdominal pain (9), research for primitive neoplasm (6), diarrhea with malabsorption (1). 80.6% of the tumors were identified solely based on VCE findings. 55 patients underwent VCE as the thierd procedure after a negative bidiretional endoscopy; 69 underwent a mean of 1.47 examinations before VCE. the lesions were single in 89.5% of cases, multiple in 10.5%. VCE retention occurred in 9.8% of patients. After VCE, 54 patients underwent 57 other examinations before treatment. The diagnostic yield of enteroscopy performed before VCE was 9%, compared with 77% when performed after a positive VCE examination (p<0.0001). Treatment was surgery in 92% of cases. Conclusions: In our series the frequency of SB tumors was 2.4%.The majority of patients had obscure GI bleeding.VCE results led directly to treatment in 47% of patients, and oriented the subsequent endoscopic work up in 28%

Prioritisation of colonoscopy services in colorectal cancer screening programmes to minimise impact of COVID-19 pandemic on predicted cancer burden: A comparative modelling study

Objectives: Colorectal cancer (CRC) screening with a faecal immunochemical test (FIT) has been disrupted in many countries during the COVID-19 pandemic. Performing catch-up of missed screens while maintaining regular screening services requires additional colonoscopy capacity that may not be available. This study aimed to compare strategies that clear the screening backlog using limited colonoscopy resources. Methods: A range of strategies were simulated using four country-specific CRC natural-history models: Adenoma and Serrated pathway to Colorectal CAncer (ASCCA) and MIcrosimulation SCreening ANalysis for CRC (MISCAN-Colon) (both in the Netherlands), Policy1-Bowel (Australia) and OncoSim (Canada). Strategies assumed a 3-month screening disruption with varying recovery period lengths (6, 12, and 24 months) and varying FIT thresholds for diagnostic colonoscopy. Increasing the FIT threshold reduces the number of referrals to diagnostic colonoscopy. Outcomes for each strategy were colonoscopy demand and excess CRC-related deaths due to the disruption. Results: Performing catch-up using the regular FIT threshold in 6, 12 and 24 months could prevent most excess CRC-related deaths, but required 50%, 25% and 12.5% additional colonoscopy demand, respectively. Without exceeding usual colonoscopy demand, up to 60% of excess CRC-related deaths can be prevented by increasing the FIT threshold for 12 or 24 months. Large increases in FIT threshold could lead to additional deaths rather than preventing them. Conclusions: Clearing the screening backlog in 24 months could avert most excess CRC-related deaths due to a 3-month disruption but would require a small increase in colonoscopy demand. Increasing the FIT threshold slightly over 24 months could ease the pressure on colonoscopy resources

Increased diagnostic yield of small bowel tumors with PillCam: the role of capsule endoscopy in the diagnosis and treatment of gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GISTs). Italian single-center experience.

Background. Gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GISTs) are rare tumors, accounting for 1-3% of all gastrointestinal malignancies; they are, however, the most common gastric and small bowel mesenchymal tumors. The length and relative inaccessibility of the small bowel have long constrained the diagnosis of GISTs mainly presenting with chronic or intermittent bleeding as the sole clinical manifestation. Aim. To report on the prevalence of small bowel GISTs in a prospectively recorded series of patients undergoing capsule endoscopy (CE). Patients and methods. Between 2001 and 2007 five hundred patients were referred to our endoscopy unit for small bowel evaluation with capsule endoscopy. We retrospectively evaluated all charts. The main indications for CE were obscure-occult or obscure-overt bleeding. Two hundred eighty-nine patients underwent CE for either obscure-occult or obscure-overt bleeding and 211 for other indications. Patient outcome and care processes were measured by follow-up telephone interviews and chart review. Statistical computations were performed using Fisher\u2019s exact test and Student\u2019s t-test. Results. CE identified a small bowel tumor in 20 patients (4.0%) and 9 tumors turned out to be GISTs (45.0%). Traditional endoscopic and radiological imaging failed to detect the GIST in all these cases. In one case a small bowel GIST was diagnosed by angiography and CE proved false negative. Overall, CE was able to diagnose a small bowel GIST in 9 out of 10 cases. All patients underwent surgical treatment and showed normalized hemoglobin levels at follow-up. The main limitation of this study is the small number of cases. Conclusions. CE is an effective and sensitive diagnostic device compared with conventional radiology and plays an important role in the algorithm for the diagnostic work-up of suspected small bowel tumors