Mesenteric Pseudocyst of the Small Bowel in Gastric Cancer Patient: A Case Report

Mesenteric pseudocyst is rare. This term is used to describe the abdominal cystic mass, without the origin of abdominal organ. We presented a case of mesenteric pseudocyst of the small bowel in a 70-year-old man. Esophago-gastro-duodenoscopy showed a 3.5 cm sized excavated lesion on the posterior wall of angle. Endocopic biopsy confirmed a histologic diagnosis of the poorly differentiated adenocarcinoma, which includes the signet ring cell component. Abdominal computed tomography scan showed a focal mucosal enhancement in the posterior wall of angle of the stomach, a 2.4 cm sized enhancing mass on the distal small bowel loop, without distant metastases or ascites in rectal shelf, and multiple gallbladder stones. The patient underwent subtotal gastrectomy with gastroduodenostomy, segmental resection of the small bowel, and cholecystectomy. The final pathological diagnosis was mesenteric pseudocyst. This is the first case report describing incidentally detected mesenteric pseudocyst of the small bowel in gastric cancer patients

Educational Disparities in Distribution of Cardiovascular Risk Factors and Quality of Care in Korean Adults: Korean National Health and Nutrition Survey IV.

Background : The purpose of this study was to investigate how educational status influences cardiovascular risk factors and care of diabetes mellitus and hypertension. Methods : From Korean National Health and Nutrition Survey IV, we obtained survey results of 6,835 men and 9,067 women more than 30 years old. We performed multivariate logistic regression to compare cardiovascular risk factors and care of hypertension and diabetes respective to educational status. Results : There were disparities in cardiovascular risk factors by educational status. In men, impaired fasting glucose, high triglyceride, and smoking were less frequently found in the highest educated group than in the middle educated group. In women, the prevalence of abdominal obesity, impaired fasting glucose, high blood pressure, high triglyceride, and metabolic syndrome among the highest educated group were significantly lower. The proportion of those with proper physical activity in the highest educated group was found to be less than that of the middle educated group, regardless of gender. For care of diabetes mellitus and hypertension, disease recognition and treatment were lower among the lowest educated group in men, while these disparities were not shown in women. Instead, the lowest educated group in diabetic women received screening exams for eye and kidney complications less than the middle education group. In both genders, the high education group had a higher chance of receiving education about diabetes mellitus. Conclusion : There were educational disparities in cardiovascular risk factors and care of hypertension and diabetes mellitus. The disparities were found to be different by gender.OAIID:oai:osos.snu.ac.kr:snu2013-01/102/0000052039/4SEQ:4PERF_CD:SNU2013-01EVAL_ITEM_CD:102USER_ID:0000052039ADJUST_YN:NEMP_ID:A077862DEPT_CD:806FILENAME:Educational Disparities in Distribution of Cardiovascular Risk.pdfDEPT_NM:의과학과EMAIL:[email protected]_YN:NCONFIRM:

Could Fractional Exhaled Nitric Oxide Test be Useful in Predicting Inhaled Corticosteroid Responsiveness in Chronic Cough? A Systematic Review

© 2016 Background Fractional exhaled nitric oxide (FENO) is a safe and convenient test for assessing T H 2 airway inflammation, which is potentially useful in the management of patients with chronic cough. Objective To summarize the current evidence on the diagnostic usefulness of FENO for predicting inhaled corticosteroid (ICS) responsiveness in patients with chronic cough. Methods A systematic literature review was conducted to identify articles published in peer-reviewed journals up to February 2015, without language restriction. We included studies that reported the usefulness of FENO (index test) for predicting ICS responsiveness (reference standard) in patients with chronic cough (target condition). The data were extracted to construct a 2 × 2 accuracy table. Study quality was assessed with Quality Assessment of Diagnostic Accuracy Studies 2. Results We identified 5 original studies (2 prospective and 3 retrospective studies). We identified considerable heterogeneities in study design and outcome definitions, and thus were unable to perform a meta-analysis. The proportion of ICS responders ranged from 44% to 59%. Sensitivity and specificity ranged from 53% to 90%, and from 63% to 97%, respectively. The reported area under the curve ranged from abou t 0.60 to 0.87; however, studies with a prospective design and a lower prevalence of asthma had lower area under the curve values. None measured placebo effects or objective cough frequency. Conclusions We did not find strong evidence to support the use of FENO tests for predicting ICS responsiveness in chronic cough. Further studies need to have a randomized, placebo-controlled design, and should use validated measurement tools for cough. Standardization would facilitate the development of clinical evidence

Pressure-Dependent Structure of BaZrO3 Crystals as Determined by Raman Spectroscopy

The structure of dielectric perovskite BaZrO3, long known to be cubic at room temperature without any structural phase transition with variation in temperature, has been recently disputed to have different ground state structures with lower symmetries involving octahedra rotation. Pressure-dependent Raman scattering measurements can identify the hierarchy of energetically-adjacent polymorphs, helping in turn to understand its ground state structure at atmospheric pressure. Here, the Raman scattering spectra of high-quality BaZrO3 single crystals grown by the optical floating zone method are investigated in a pressure range from 1 atm to 42 GPa. First, based on the analyses of the infrared and Raman spectra measured at atmospheric pressure, it was found that all the observed vibrational modes could be assigned according to the cubic Pm3??m structure. In addition, by applying pressure, two structural phase transitions were found at 8.4 and 19.2 GPa, one from the cubic to the rhombohedral R3??c phase and the other from the rhombohedral to the tetragonal I4/mcm phase. Based on the two pressure-induced structural phase transitions, the true ground state structure of BaZrO3 at room temperature and ambient pressure was corroborated to be cubic while the rhombohedral phase was the closest second

Engineering Enzyme Specificity Using Computational Design of a Defined-Sequence Library

Engineered biosynthetic pathways have the potential to produce high-value molecules from inexpensive feedstocks, but a key limitation is engineering enzymes with high activity and specificity for new reactions. Here, we developed a method for combining structure-based computational protein design with library-based enzyme screening, in which inter-residue correlations favored by the design are encoded into a defined-sequence library. We validated this approach by engineering a glucose 6-oxidase enzyme for use in a proposed pathway to convert D-glucose into D-glucaric acid. The most active variant, identified after only one round of diversification and screening of only 10,000 wells, is approximately 400-fold more active on glucose than is the wild-type enzyme. We anticipate that this strategy will be broadly applicable to the discovery of new enzymes for engineered biological pathways.United States. Office of Naval Research. Young Investigator Program (Grant N000140510656)National Science Foundation (U.S.) (Synthetic Biology Engineering Research Center. Grant EEC-0540879)MIT Faculty Start-up FundCodon Devices, Inc

Effective Management of Single Dominant Follicle with Continuous Administration of Gonadotropin-Releasing Hormone Agonist

With the widespread use of gonadotropin-releasing hormone agonist (GnRH-a) for in vitro fertilization(IVF) program, the cancellation rate during controlled ovarian hyperstimulation(COH} is much lowered. However, poor responders with poor estradioI(E2} rise or single dominant follicle still persist in GnRH-a combined COH, and the decision to cancel the cycle and the counselling of further cycles remain very perplexing. Three poor responders with single dominant follicle during GnRH-a combined COH for IVF were, rather than being cancelled, managed by continuous administration of GnRH-a and restimulation with initial low dosage and subsequent high dosage of follicle-stimulating hormone until an appropriate number of follicles was obtained. While no pregnant case treated in this way, the management resulted in a higher E2 level, and more oocytes and embryos. We suggest that this approach could serve as an alternative to cancellation in GnRH-a combined COH

Cyclic AMP Concentrations in Follicular Fluids: Relationship to Outcomes of In Vitro Fertilization Cycles

Follicular fluids and their matched oocytes were obtained from 16 follicles of 7 women who conceived after in vitro fertilization(IVF), and 49 follicles of 17 women who failed to conceive after the procedure. Follicular development was induced with a combination of follicle-stimulating hormone and human menopausal gonadotropin. There was no significant difference in follicular cyclic AMP concentrations between preovulatory and immature oocytes. However, follicles of preovulatory oocytes obtained from women who conceived after IVF contained lower cyclic AMP concentrations than those from women who failed to conceive after the procedure. Follicles of cleaved oocytes from pregnant women contained lower cyclic AMP concentrations than those of cleaved oocytes from nonpregnant women or all uncleaved oocytes. These results suggest that lower cyclic AMP concentrations in follicular fluids are associated with successful pregnancies in IVF cycles