Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) patients with vitamin D deficiency show an increased risk of hospital admission, surgery, and loss of response to biologic therapy while high vitamin D levels are ...identified as a protective factor. Our goal was to investigate the prevalence of untreated and undertreated vitamin D deficiency and factors associated with vitamin D deficiency. In this cross-sectional study, we measured serum vitamin D in a random sample of Caucasian IBD patients. Vitamin D deficiency was defined as <50 nmol/L and insuficiency as 50-75 nmol/L. Supplementation was defined as taking 800-2000 IU vitamin D daily. Untreated patients were defined as not taking supplementation and undertreated group as receiving supplementation but showing vitamin D deficiency or insuficiency despite treatment. Our study included 185 IBD patients, i.e. 126 (68.1%) with Crohn's disease (CD) and 59 (31.9%) with ulcerative colitis (UC). Overall, 108 (58.4%) patients had vitamin D deficiency and 60 (32.4%) patients vitamin D insuficiency. There were 16 (14.8%) and 11 (18.3%) treated patients in vitamin D deficiency and vitamin D insuficiency group, respectively. The rate of untreated patients was 81.7% (n=49) in vitamin D deficiency group and 85.2% (n=92) in vitamin D insuficiency group. Tumor necrosis factor alpha inhibitors were associated with higher serum vitamin D levels in CD and UC, and ileal involvement, ileal and ileocolonic resection with lower levels. In conclusion, not only is vitamin D deficiency common in IBD patients but the proportion of untreated and undertreated patients is considerably high. We suggest regular monitoring of vitamin D levels in IBD patients regardless of receiving vitamin D supplementation therapy. Key words: Inflammatory bowel diseases; Vitamin D deficiency; Crohn's disease; Colitis, ulcerative
PCV2 has emerged as one of the most devastating viral infections of swine farming, causing a relevant economic impact due to direct losses and control strategies expenses. Epidemiological and ...experimental studies have evidenced that genetic diversity is potentially affecting the virulence of PVC2. The growing number of PCV2 complete genomes and partial sequences available at GenBank questioned the accepted PCV2 classification.
Nine hundred seventy five PCV2 complete genomes and 1,270 ORF2 sequences available from GenBank were subjected to recombination, PASC and phylogenetic analyses and results were used for comparison with previous classification scheme.
The outcome of these analyses favors the recognition of four genotypes on the basis of ORF2 sequences, namely PCV2a, PCV2b, PCV2c and PCV2d-mPCV2b. To deal with the difficulty of founding an unambiguous classification and accounting the impossibility to define a p-distance cut-off, a set of reference sequences that could be used in further phylogenetic studies for PCV2 genotyping was established. Being aware that extensive phylogenetic analyses are time-consuming and often impracticable during routine diagnostic activity, ORF2 nucleotide positions adequately conserved in the reference sequences were identified and reported to allow a quick genotype differentiation.
Globally, the present work provides an updated scenario of PCV2 genotypes distribution and, based on the limits of the previous classification criteria, proposes new rapid and effective schemes for differentiating the four defined PCV2 genotypes.
- Radiological diagnostic methods have a significant role in the preoperative and postoperative care of patients after kidney transplantation. Improvement and innovations in technology, but also the ...growing experience of the radiologists who deal with kidney transplant patients as part of the transplant team lead to earlier detection of complications in the postoperative period, which are the leading cause of transplant failure. In this article, we describe, through diagnostic imaging examples, detailed evaluation of all possible complications that can occur after kidney transplantation, with evaluation of different possible diagnostic methods that can be used in the preoperative assessment and postoperative follow up and care of the transplanted patient. The goal of this article is to demonstrate and summarize in detail the possible complications of renal transplantation and how to best diagnostically approach them, with special reference to ultrasound which is the main imaging method for this group of conditions.
To develop a method to experimentally induce Borrelia burgdorferi infection in young adult dogs.
22 healthy Beagles.
All dogs were verified to be free of borreliosis. Twenty 6-month-old dogs were ...exposed to Borrelia burgdorferi-infected adult ticks and treated with dexamethasone for 5 consecutive days. Two dogs not exposed to ticks were treated with dexamethasone and served as negative-control dogs. Clinical signs, results of microbial culture and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing, immunologic responses, and gross and histologic lesions were evaluated 9 months after tick exposure.
Predominant clinical signs were episodic pyrexia and lameness in 12 of 20 dogs. Infection with B burgdorferi was detected in microbial cultures of skin biopsy specimens and various tissues obtained during necropsy in 19 of 20 dogs and in all 20 dogs by use of a PCR assay. All 20 exposed dogs seroconverted and developed chronic nonsuppurative arthritis. Three dogs also developed mild focal meningitis, 1 dog developed mild focal encephalitis, and 18 dogs developed perineuritis or rare neuritis. Control dogs were seronegative, had negative results for microbial culture and PCR testing, and did not develop lesions.
Use of this technique successfully induced borreliosis in young dogs. Dogs with experimentally induced borreliosis may be useful in evaluating vaccines, chemotherapeutic agents, and the pathogenesis of borreliosis-induced arthritis.
To immunohistochemically evaluate the expression of MAGE-A1, MAGE-A, and NY-ESO-1 cancer/testis (C/T) tumor antigens in medullary breast cancer (MBC) tumor samples and to analyze it in relation to ...the clinicopathological features.
This retrospective study included samples from 49 patients: 40 with typical MBC and 9 with atypical MBC. Tumor specimens were obtained from patients operated on in the University Hospital for Tumors and the Sisters of Mercy University Hospital, Zagreb, Croatia, from 1999 to 2005. Standard immunohistochemistry was used on archival paraffin-embedded MBC tissues.
MAGE-A1, MAGE-A, and NY-ESO-1 antigens were expressed in 33% (16/49), 33% (16/49), and 22% (11/49) of patients, respectively. No difference between the groups with and without C/T tumor antigen expression in age at diagnosis, tumor size, axillary lymph node metastasis, adjuvant therapy, and HER-2 expression was identified. Significantly more patients died in the MAGE-A-positive group than in the MAGE-A-negative group (P=0.010), whereas a borderline significance was found between MAGE-A1-positive and the MAGE-A1-negative group (P=0.079) and between NY-ESO-1-positive and NY-ESO-1-negative group (P=0.117). Overall survival, as evaluated by the Kaplan-Meier curves, was lower in MAGE-A1- (P=0.031), MAGE-A- (P=0.004), NY-ESO-1-positive groups (P=0.077).
Expression of C/T antigens may represent a marker of potential prognostic relevance in MBC.
The introduction of microprocessor technology enabled multiple protection functions to be integrated into a common protection platform which has advantages when applied to generator protection. This ...paper provides an insight into industry application experience in using multifunction generator protection systems on various sizes and types of generators. Included are discussions on application and performance differences between multifunction protection systems and single function static and electromechanical relaying devices. Also included is a summary of the various types of tests performed on the multifunction protection systems by the user. The paper additionally addresses the need for application of redundancy and backup protection when applying multifunction generator protection systems on large or important generators.
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