Antenatal screening and its possible meaning from unborn baby's perspective

In recent decades antenatal screening has become one of the most routine procedure of pregnancy-follow up and the subject of hot debate in bioethics circles. In this paper the rationale behind doing antenatal screening and the actual and potential problems that it may cause will be discussed. The paper will examine the issue from the point of wiew of parents, health care professionals and, most importantly, the child-to-be. It will show how unthoughtfully antenatal screening is performed and how pregnancy is treated almost as a disease just since the emergence of antenatal screening. Genetic screening and ethical problems caused by the procedure will also be addressed and I will suggest that screening is more to do with the interests of others rather than those of the child-to be

A prenatally detected adrenal cyst treated by adrenal-sparing surgery: case report and review of the literature

A neonatal case of left adrenal cyst detected in utero and successfully treated by adrenal-sparing surgery is presented and discussed with review of the literature. Incidentally discovered prenatal adrenal masses present a diagnostic dilemma. Benign and malignant conditions can present as a fetal suprarenal mass. There is a wide spectrum of management modalities ranging from followup by serial sonographic scanning during pregnancy to early primary excision of the mass. We report a neonate with prenatal diagnosis of a cystic mass arising from the left adrenal gland. Postnatal excision of the mass without adrenalectomy was carried out. Frozen sections of the mass and a biopsy of the left adrenal gland confirmed the benign nature of the cyst and normal adrenal tissue. The uniloculated cyst was reported as a pseudocyst. After surgery, the recovery was uneventful, and the patient was discharged 4 days postoperatively in good condition. On the basis of this case and review of the literature, we may conclude that early primary surgical excision is recommended for either diagnosis or treatment if the results of prenatal or postnatal imaging studies are unreliable for the precise diagnosis of suprarenal mass. Adrenal-sparing surgery is recommended if pathological evaluation of frozen sections has confirmed the benign nature of the mass.Keywords: adrenal-sparing surgery, neonates, prenatal diagnosis, suprarenal cys

Integrating biological pathways and genomic profiles with ChiBE 2

Cataloged from PDF version of article.Background: Dynamic visual exploration of detailed pathway information can help researchers digest and interpret complex mechanisms and genomic datasets. Results: ChiBE is a free, open-source software tool for visualizing, querying, and analyzing human biological pathways in BioPAX format. The recently released version 2 can search for neighborhoods, paths between molecules, and common regulators/targets of molecules, on large integrated cellular networks in the Pathway Commons database as well as in local BioPAX models. Resulting networks can be automatically laid out for visualization using a graphically rich, process-centric notation. Profiling data from the cBioPortal for Cancer Genomics and expression data from the Gene Expression Omnibus can be overlaid on these networks. Conclusions: ChiBE's new capabilities are organized around a genomics-oriented workflow and offer a unique comprehensive pathway analysis solution for genomics researchers

H3K4 demethylation by Jarid1a and Jarid1b contributes to retinoblastoma-mediated gene silencing during cellular senescence

Cellular senescence is a tumor-suppressive program that involves chromatin reorganization and specific changes in gene expression that trigger an irreversible cell-cycle arrest. Here we combine quantitative mass spectrometry, ChIP deep-sequencing, and functional studies to determine the role of histone modifications on chromatin structure and gene-expression alterations associated with senescence in primary human cells. We uncover distinct senescence-associated changes in histone-modification patterns consistent with a repressive chromatin environment and link the establishment of one of these patterns-loss of H3K4 methylation-to the retinoblastoma tumor suppressor and the H3K4 demethylases Jarid1a and Jarid1b. Our results show that Jarid1a/b-mediated H3K4 demethylation contributes to silencing of retinoblastoma target genes in senescent cells, suggesting a mechanism by which retinoblastoma triggers gene silencing. Therefore, we link the Jarid1a and Jarid1b demethylases to a tumor-suppressor network controlling cellular senescence

Inequality and Procedural Justice in Social Dilemmas

This study investigates the influence of resource inequality and the fairness of the allocation procedure of unequal resources on cooperative behavior in social dilemmas. We propose a simple formal behavioral model that incorporates conflicting selfish and social motivations. This model allows us to predict how inequality influences cooperative behavior. Allocation of resources is manipulated by three treatments that vary in terms of procedural justice: allocating resources randomly, based on merit, and based on ascription. As predicted, procedural justice influences cooperation significantly. Moreover, gender is found to be an important factor interacting with the association between procedural justice and cooperative behavior.

An applied study of patient perception for service quality in orthopedics clinics of public and private hospitals: A case study in Istanbul

It is apparent that hospitals’ service quality is of utmost importance for the patients. The main objective of the study is to find out the patients’ public and private hospital preferences and the elements determining their preferences. Some differences concerning the increase in the patient satisfaction were observed in the study. The study examines whether the patients’ views on general quality level of orthopedics clinics differ according to some characteristics. In the study, measurement material is the questionnaire prepared for the patients in “Istanbul Private Maltepe Hospital”. Within the scope of the study, 250 questionnaires were distributed to the participants. The questionnaire, answered by randomly selected 169 patients, was considered suitable for the analysis. At the end of the reliability analysis, Cronbach’s coefficient about the basic data was found 0,928. At the end of the study, it has been observed that physicians, nurses, services and clinical factors have a profound impact on the patient satisfaction. It has been observed that the participants are highly satisfied with physician and nurse services, polyclinic hygiene, interest of personnel, treatment and care services. Most of the participants think positively for the hospital quality, and patients at orthopedics clinics also think positively. Further, it has been observed that the level of patients’ satisfaction differs according to demographical characteristics

An Analysis of Orthopedists and Physiatrists’ Perceptions of Organizational Culture, Organizational Commitment and Leadership In Terms of Some Variables,

Background: To establish an efficient organizational culture and leadership is of main importance for a high quality service in the hospitals. Organizational culture, organizational commitment, decision making process, and the mission and vision of the corporation, and the efficient leadership behaviors are among the topics that have been emphasized recently. It is worth analyzing the perceptions of Orthopedists and Physiatrists about organizational culture, organizational commitment and leadership in order to maintain service quality, organizational culture and performance and to take necessary precautions. Objective: The purpose of the study is to examine the Orthopedists and Physiatrists‟ perceptions of organizational culture, organizational commitment and decision making process and leadership definitions in terms of some variables. In this respect, a questionnaire has been prepared for 860 participants. Data obtained from the participants have been analyzed with PASW Statistics 18 package programme. Cronbach's Alpha coefficient was 0.962 at the end of the reliability analysis. Data obtained from the study have been analyzed with descriptive statistics, reliability analysis, chi square, ANOVA, Duncan, Man-Whitney-U, Kruskal Wallis, Wilcoxon, Kolmogorov-Smirnov-Z tests. Results: it has been observed that, the position in the corporation and educational factors differentiate in the items concerning the organizational culture, and the leadership definitions differ according to gender, age, marital status, and education. Conclusion: At the end of the study, There is a difference between hospital commitment and age, the vision and the mission of the corporation, and gender and education. Further to this, perceptions of the leadership differ according to gender

The cBio cancer Genomics portal: An open platform for exploring multidimensional cancer genomics data

Cataloged from PDF version of article.The cBio Cancer Genomics Portal (http://cbioportal.org) is an open-access resource for interactive exploration of multidimensional cancer genomics data sets, currently providing access to data from more than 5,000 tumor samples from 20 cancer studies. The cBio Cancer Genomics Portal significantly lowers the barriers between complex genomic data and cancer researchers who want rapid, intuitive, and high-quality access to molecular profiles and clinical attributes from large-scale cancer genomics projects and empowers researchers to translate these rich data sets into biologic insights and clinical applications. © 2012 American Association for Cancer Research