Is Helicobacter pylori infection a risk factor for childhood periodic syndromes?

AbstractBackground and objectivesHelicobacter pylori (H. pylori) infection has been assumed to have roles in various extra-digestive diseases. The current study was designed to evaluate the incidence of H. pylori infection in patients with cyclic vomiting syndrome and its possible role in the etiology of this disease.Design and settingIn this case-control study, 120 cases with diagnoses of cyclic vomiting or abdominal migraine who were registered at the Gastroenterology Clinic at Shiraz University of Medical Sciences from 2010 to 2013 were enrolled.Materials and methodsPrimarily information regarding the patients' diseases were collected with a data gathering sheet, and fresh morning stool samples were collected from the patients and examined for H. pylori stool antigen with the H. pylori Ag EIA test kit. The results were compared with those of healthy children from the control group.ResultsA total of 120 patients with cyclic vomiting (47.5%) and abdominal migraine (52.5%) with a mean age of 7.1 ± 3.4 (range 2–16 years) and a male-to-female ratio of 1.6 were included. The HPs Ag tests were positive in only 7 (5.8%) patients in our case group, and the HPs Ag tests were positive in 13 (13%) of the children in the control group; this difference was statistically insignificant.ConclusionOur study did not support H. pylori infection as an etiological factor in CV or AM

Discrepancy of target sites between clinician and cytopathological reports in head neck fine needle aspiration: Did I miss the target or did the clinician mistake the organ site?

The diagnostic accuracy of fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) of head and neck lesions is relatively high, but cytologic interpretation might be confusing if the sample is lacking typical cytologic features according to labeled site by physician. These errors may have an impact on pathology search engines, healthcare costs or even adverse outcomes. The cytology archive database of multiple institutions in southern Iran and Australia covering the period 2001–2011, were searched using keywords: salivary gland, head, neck, FNAC, and cytology. All the extracted reports were reviewed. The reports which showed discordance between the clinician’s impression of the organ involved and subsequent fine needle biopsy request, and the eventual cytological diagnosis were selected. The cytological diagnosis was confirmed by histology or cell block, with assistance from imaging, clinical outcome, physical examination, molecular studies, or microbiological culture. The total number of 10,200 head and neck superficial FNAC were included in the study, from which 48 cases showed discordance between the clinicians request and the actual site of pathology. Apart from the histopathology, the imaging, clinical history, physical examination, immunohistochemical study, microbiologic culture and molecular testing helped to finalize the target organ of pathology in 23, 6, 7, 8, 2, and 1 cases respectively. The commonest discrepancies were for FNAC of “salivary gland” [total: 20 with actual final pathology in: bone (7), soft tissue (5), lymph node (3), odontogenic (3) and skin (2)], “lymph node” [total: 12 with final pathology in: soft tissue (3), skin (3), bone (1) and brain (1)], “soft tissue” [total: 11 with final pathology in: bone (5), skin (2), salivary gland (1), and ocular region (1)] and “skin” [total: 5 with final pathology in: lymph node (2), bone (1), soft tissue (1) and salivary gland (1)]. The primary physician requesting FNAC of head and neck lesions are incorrect in their clinical impression of the actual site in nearly 0.5 percent of cases, due to the overlapping clinical and imaging findings or possibly due to inadequate history taking or physical examination

Diagnostic terminology for reporting thyroid fine needle aspiration cytology: European Federation of Cytology Societies thyroid working party symposium, Lisbon 2009

PubMedID: 21054822G. Kocjan, B. Cochand-Priollet, P. P. de Agustin, C. Bourgain, A. Chandra, Y. Daneshbod, A. Deery, J. Duskova, C. Ersoz, G. Fadda, A. Fassina, P. Firat, B. Jimenez-Ayala, P. Karakitsos, O. Koperek, N. Matesa, D. Poller, L. Thienpont, A. Ryska, U. Schenck, T. Sauer, F. Schmitt, E. Tani, T. Toivonen, M. Tötsch, G. Troncone, L. Vass and P. Vielh Diagnostic terminology for reporting thyroid fine needle aspiration cytology: European Federation of Cytology Societies thyroid working party symposium, Lisbon 2009 A European Federation of Cytology Societies (EFCS) working party of 28 members from 14 European countries met at the European Congress of Cytology in Lisbon in September 2009, with two observers from the USA, to discuss the need for standardising thyroid FNA nomenclature in the light of the National Institute of Cancer (NCI) recommendations resulting from the State of the Science conference in Bethesda in 2007. The data were obtained through two questionnaires sent by email and a transcript of the live discussion at the congress, which is presented in full. The surveys and discussion showed that there were currently no national terminologies for reporting thyroid FNA in the different European countries except in Italy and the UK. Personal, 'local', surgical pathology and descriptive terminologies were in use. All but one of the working party members agreed that thyroid FNA reporting should be standardised. Whilst almost a third would adopt the NCI Bethesda terminology, which offers the advantages of a 'risk of cancer' correlation and is linked to clinical recommendations, more than half favoured a translation of local terminology as the first step towards a unified nomenclature, as has been done recently in the UK. There was some disagreement about the use of: a) the six-tiered as opposed to four or five-tiered systems, b) the use of an indeterminate category and c) the 'follicular neoplasm' category, which was felt by some participants not to be different from the 'suspicious of malignancy' category. The conclusions will be passed to the different national societies of cytology for discussion, who will be asked to map their local terminologies to the Bethesda classification, observe its acceptance by clinicians and audit its correlation with outcome. © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd