Safety and tolerability of diazoxide in Japanese patients with hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemia

Diazoxide is a non-diuretic benzothiadiazine derivative, one of a group of substances introduced into clinical practice in the 1950s for the treatment of hypertension. Fajans reported the use of diazoxide for the treatment of insulinoma in 1979. Although patients with hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemia worldwide have been treated with diazoxide for more than 30 years, there are no recent reports about the adverse effects of this drug in Asian patients, including Japanese patients. Herein, we report the results of our retrospective clinical record review of 6 Japanese patients (3 females and 3 males, ranging in age from 58 to 91 years) with hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemia and inoperable insulinoma treated with diazoxide. Diazoxide improved control of hypoglycemic symptoms and maintained normoglycemia in 5 of the 6 patients, and was ineffective in one patient. Surprisingly, although all 6 patients received diazoxide according to the treatment strategy recommended in Western patients, 5 of the 6 patients developed edema and two developed congestive heart failure. Thus, when starting treatment with diazoxide in Japanese patients, the symptoms and signs of fluid retention should be evaluated carefully. Also, appropriate protocols for treatment with diazoxide should be evaluated by means of clinical trials in Japanese patients with hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemia

Precise Comparison of 14C Ages from Choukai Jindai Cedar with IntCal04 Raw Data

We measured the radiocarbon ages of 165 single-year tree rings from a Japanese Choukai Jindai cedar using accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS). By wiggle-matching the Choukai_AMS data set to the IntCal04 calibration data using OxCal v 3.10 and using the variation of the correlation coefficients between the Choukai_AMS and IntCal04 data sets, we precisely re-estimated that the 321 Choukai Jindai cedar tree rings range from 780 to 460 cal BC with an accuracy of 8 yr. The Choukai_AMS data set is older than the 3 raw data sets of European tree rings that comprise IntCal04. The Belfast and Seattle data sets are younger by -21.3 +/- 5.5 and -22.7 +/- 5.6 14C yr, respectively. The Choukai Jindai cedar is ~22 14C yr older than the European tree rings, which is equivalent to an offset of -2.8‰ in 14C. In addition, the Choukai_AMS data set correlates well with the Belfast and Seattle data sets, with correlation coefficients of 0.89 and 0.68, respectively, between the temporal profiles. Hence, the temporal profile of the Choukai 14C ages shows a global variation.The Radiocarbon archives are made available by Radiocarbon and the University of Arizona Libraries. Contact [email protected] for further information.Migrated from OJS platform February 202

Safety and tolerability of diazoxide in Japanese patients with hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemia

Diazoxide is a non-diuretic benzothiadiazine derivative, one of a group of substances introduced into clinical practice in the 1950s for the treatment of hypertension. Fajans reported the use of diazoxide for the treatment of insulinoma in 1979. Although patients with hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemia worldwide have been treated with diazoxide for more than 30 years, there are no recent reports about the adverse effects of this drug in Asian patients, including Japanese patients. Herein, we report the results of our retrospective clinical record review of 6 Japanese patients (3 females and 3 males, ranging in age from 58 to 91 years) with hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemia and inoperable insulinoma treated with diazoxide. Diazoxide improved control of hypoglycemic symptoms and maintained normoglycemia in 5 of the 6 patients, and was ineffective in one patient. Surprisingly, although all 6 patients received diazoxide according to the treatment strategy recommended in Western patients, 5 of the 6 patients developed edema and two developed congestive heart failure. Thus, when starting treatment with diazoxide in Japanese patients, the symptoms and signs of fluid retention should be evaluated carefully. Also, appropriate protocols for treatment with diazoxide should be evaluated by means of clinical trials in Japanese patients with hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemia

Combination of hTERT and bmi-1, E6, or E7 Induces Prolongation of the Life Span of Bone Marrow Stromal Cells from an Elderly Donor without Affecting Their Neurogenic Potential

Murine bone marrow stromal cells differentiate not only into mesodermal derivatives, such as osteocytes, chondrocytes, adipocytes, skeletal myocytes, and cardiomyocytes, but also into neuroectodermal cells in vitro. Human bone marrow stromal cells are easy to isolate but difficult to study because of their limited life span. To overcome this problem, we attempted to prolong the life span of bone marrow stromal cells and investigated whether bone marrow stromal cells modified with bmi-1, hTERT, E6, and E7 retained their differentiated capability, or multipotency. In this study, we demonstrated that the life span of bone marrow stromal cells derived from a 91-year-old donor could be extended and that the stromal cells with an extended life span differentiated into neuronal cells in vitro. We examined the neuronally differentiated cells morphologically, physiologically, and biologically and compared the gene profiles of undifferentiated and differentiated cells. The neuronally differentiated cells exhibited characteristics similar to those of midbrain neuronal progenitors. Thus, the results of this study support the possible use of autologous-cell graft systems to treat central nervous system diseases in geriatric patients

Evaluation of inadequate, indeterminate, false-negative and false-positive cases in cytological examination for breast cancer according to histological type

Abstract Background We previously investigated the current status of breast cytology cancer screening at seven institutes in our area of southern Fukuoka Prefecture, and found some differences in diagnostic accuracy among the institutions. In the present study, we evaluated the cases involved and noted possible reasons for their original cytological classification as inadequate, indeterminate, false-negative and false-positive according to histological type. Methods We evaluated the histological findings in 5693 individuals who underwent cytological examination for breast cancer (including inadequate, indeterminate, false-negative and false-positive cases), to determine the most common histological types and/or features in these settings and the usefulness/limitations of cytological examination for the diagnosis of breast cancer. Results Among 1152 cytologically inadequate cases, histology revealed that 75/173 (43.6%) cases were benign, including mastopathy (fibrocystic disease) in 38.6%, fibroadenoma in 24.0% and papilloma in 5.3%. Ninety-five of 173 (54.9%) cases were histologically malignant, with scirrhous growing type, invasive ductal carcinoma (SIDC) being significantly more frequent (49.5%) than papillotubular growing type (Papi-tub) (P P = 0.0001) and ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) (P = 0.0001). Among 458 indeterminate cases, 54/139 (38.8%) were histologically benign (mastopathy, 30.0%; fibroadenoma, 27.8%; papilloma, 26.0%) and 73/139 (52.5%) were malignant, with SIDC being the most frequent malignant tumor (37.0%). Among 52 false-negative cases, SIDC was significantly more frequent (42.3%) than DCIS (P = 0.0049) and Papi-tub (P = 0.001). There were three false-positive cases, with one each of fibroadenoma, epidermal cyst and papilloma. Conclusions The inadequate, indeterminate, false-negative and false-positive cases showed similar histological types, notably SIDC for malignant tumors, and mastopathy, fibroadenoma and papilloma for benign cases. We need to pay particular attention to the collection and assessment of aspirates for these histological types of breast disease. In particular, several inadequate, indeterminate and false-negative cases with samples collected by aspiration were diagnosed as SIDC. These findings should encourage the use of needle biopsy rather than aspiration when this histological type is identified on imaging. Namely, good communication between clinicians and pathological staff, and triple assessment (i.e., clinical, pathological and radiological assessment), are important for accurate diagnosis of aspiration samples. Virtual slides The virtual slide(s) for this article can be found here: http://www.diagnosticpathology.diagnomx.eu/vs/7349809170055423</p