Large expert-curated database for benchmarking document similarity detection in biomedical literature search

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translated into practice. To overcome this bottleneck, we have established the RElevant LIterature SearcH consortium consisting of more than 1500 scientists from 84 countries, who have collectively annotated the relevance of over 180 000 PubMed-listed articles with regard to their respective seed (input) article/s. The majority of annotations were contributed by highly experienced, original authors of the seed articles. The collected data cover 76% of all unique PubMed Medical Subject Headings descriptors. No systematic biases were observed across different experience levels, research fields or time spent on annotations. More importantly, annotations of the same document pairs contributed by different scientists were highly concordant. We further show that the three representative baseline methods used to generate recommended articles for evaluation (Okapi Best Matching 25, Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency and PubMed Related Articles) had similar overall performances. Additionally, we found that these methods each tend to produce distinct collections of recommended articles, suggesting that a hybrid method may be required to completely capture all relevant articles. The established database server located at https://relishdb.ict.griffith.edu.au is freely available for the downloading of annotation data and the blind testing of new methods. We expect that this benchmark will be useful for stimulating the development of new powerful techniques for title and title/abstract-based search engines for relevant articles in biomedical research.Peer reviewe

Laparoscopic donor hepatectomy: First experience from Indian sub-continent

Liver transplantation is a ray of hope for thousands of patients with end-stage liver disease but is currently challenged by the scarcity of donor organs worldwide. Unlike kidney transplantation where minimally invasive donor organ procurement has almost become a norm, laparoscopic procurement of hemi-liver from a living donor is still in the infancy of development, at least in the Indian sub-continent. Minimally invasive surgery has made its way into different procedures of hepatobiliary and pancreatic surgery, but only a few centres in the world are performing pure laparoscopic donor hepatectomy. We report two cases of total laparoscopic donor hepatectomy, and to the best of our knowledge, this is the first report from Indian sub-continent

Thoraco-laparoscopic Ivor-Lewis esophagectomy: the most extensive Indian experience

Aim: The overall incidence of adenocarcinoma is on the rise, mainly in the western population. Minimally invasive thoracolaparoscopic esophagectomy for adenocarcinoma of gastroesophageal junction tumors is being adopted worldwide, albeit with a slower pace. This study is to share our experience and technical modifications over two decades.Methods: This a retrospective data from 2009-2018 at a single center, including all the 143 cases of thora-colaparoscopic Ivor Lewis esophagectomies performed. There were no exclusions. The study objectives were to evaluate postoperative recovery, complications, and pathological completeness.Results: In 11 years, we have performed 532 cases of minimally invasive esophagectomies for both malignant and benign etiologies. Out of which 143 cases were of Ivor Lewis esophagectomy. The mean age of patients was 64.4 ± 10.86 years, and male to female ratio is 3:1. Out of these cases, 139 (97.20%) were performed for malignancy and 4 (2.79%) for benign cases, which include peptic stricture, sigmoid esophagus. The mean operative time is 457.97 ± 79.35 min. The mean blood loss was 138.08 ± 29.3mL. Out of these cases, the hand-sewn anastomosis was performed in 72 (50.34%), circular stapler anastomosis in 46 (32.16%) and, linear stapled anastomosis in 25 (17.48%). The mean lymph node retrieval rate was 22.68 ± 9.49 nodes. The average ICU stay in the postoperative period was 4.68 ± 3.95 days, and overall hospital stay was 13.48 ± 7.43 days. Among malignant cases (139), adenocarcinoma in 121 (87.05%), squamous cell carcinoma in 18 (12.94%). Among these cases T2, lesions in 56 (40.28%), T3 lesions in 77 (55.39%), T4 lesions in 6 (4.31%) The overall complication rate was 12.58% (pneumonia- 8.39%, RLN injury in 1.39%, anastomotic leak in 2.09%, chyle leak in 0.69%, anastomotic stricture in 12.58%). 3 (2.09%) cases had re-intervention in the form of combined endoscopic procedures (stenting) and re-thoracoscopic lavage in 3. Overall 30-day mortality in 1 case (0.69%).Conclusion: Thoracolaparoscopic esophagectomy with intrathoracic Ivor Lewis anastomosis is an excellent option for selected patients, in experienced hands

Single incision multiport versus conventional laparoscopic inguinal hernia repair: A matched comparison

Background: The popularity of single-incision procedures is on the rise as wound cosmesis is increasingly being seen as an important body image-related outcome. In this study, we assess the potential benefits of single-incision multiport laparoscopic totally extra-peritoneal (S-TEP) without using specialised ports or instruments and compare the same with the conventional laparoscopic TEP (C-TEP) surgery in terms of operative time, post-operative pain, complications, cost and cosmesis. Materials and Methods: This is a prospective case-matched study of the patients undergoing S-TEP versus C-TEP from June 2014 to December 2015. Results: Each group had 36 patients. The two groups were comparable in the clinical characteristics. The mean duration of surgery for a unilateral hernia in C-TEP and S-TEP was 45.13 ± 10.58 min and 72.63 ± 15.23 min, respectively. The mean visual analogue scale (VAS) score for pain was significantly higher in S-TEP group at post-operative day (POD) 0 and 1. However, at POD 7, there was no significant difference between the groups. At 1st and 6-week post-surgery, the cosmetic results were significantly better in S-TEP group as compared to C-TEP, however, at 6 months, the scar was highly acceptable in both treatment groups. Conclusion: S-TEP, using conventional laparoscopic instruments, is safe and feasible even in resource challenged setting. However, there is a need to review the indications and advantages of single-incision laparoscopic surgery, as no difference in cosmetic outcome by VAS score in S-TEP versus conventional laparoscopic arm seen by the end of 1 month

Laparoscopic management of 'Y-shaped' gallbladder duplication with review of literature

Gallbladder duplication is a rare congenital malformation that occurs in about 1:4000 cases. Congenital anomalies of the gallbladder and anatomical variations of their position are associated with an increased risk of complications during laparoscopic cholecystectomy. We report a case of gallbladder duplication with symptomatic cholelithiasis, who presented with recurrent episodes of biliary colic and subsequently underwent laparoscopic cholecystectomy with intraoperative cholangiography. We also discussed in brief about the available literature support in relation to incidence of this disorder, imaging modalities used, intraoperative strategies and recommended measures for safe outcomes