Int J Med Sci
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To investigate the feasibility of direct magnetic resonance portal vein thrombosis (PVT) visualization with T2*-weighted imaging (T2*WI) without contrast agent. ⋯ Our results suggest T2*WI can characterize PVT accurately with high quality without the use of intravenous contrast agents.
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Congenital heart disease (CHD) is the most common form of developmental anomaly and is the leading non-infectious cause of infant mortality. A growing body of evidence demonstrates that genetic risk factors are involved in the pathogenesis of CHD. However, CHD is a genetically heterogeneous disease and the genetic determinants for CHD in most patients remain unclear. ⋯ The variations were absent in 400 control chromosomes and the affected amino acids were completely conserved evolutionarily. The two variants were both predicted to be disease-causing by MutationTaster and PolyPhen-2, and the functional analysis revealed that the PITX2c mutants were consistently associated with significantly reduced transcriptional activity compared with their wild-type counterpart. These findings firstly link PITX2c loss-of-function mutations to atrial septal defects in humans, which provide novel insight into the molecular mechanism responsible for CHD, suggesting potential implications for the early prophylaxis and allele-specific treatment of CHD.
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Duloxetine hydrochloride is approved for the treatment or management of major depressive disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, diabetic peripheral neuropathic pain, chronic musculoskeletal pain, and fibromyalgia in the United States. These conditions affect millions of women, including those of childbearing potential. In pregnancy, pharmacological treatment is justified only if the potential benefits outweigh potential risks to mother and fetus, neonate or infant. There are no adequate and well-controlled studies in pregnant women treated with duloxetine. Post-marketing surveillance is an important tool for the assessment of drug safety in pregnancy in a naturalistic setting. ⋯ While limitations of these data are recognized, the information available to date from these two data sources suggest that the frequency of abnormal outcomes reported in duloxetine pregnancy cases is generally consistent with the historic control rates in the general population.
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As a main cellular component within the disc, nucleus pulposus (NP) cells play important roles in disc physiology. However, little is known on the biologic hallmarks of human NP cells. Therefore, the present study aimed to address the features of human NP cells. ⋯ Human degenerative NP consists of primarily viable cells. We present direct and in vivo evidence that both human annulus fibrosus and NP cells have phagocytic potential. Moreover, NP cells with long processes exist in both scoliotic and degenerative NP with lack of glucose as one of the possible underlying mechanisms.
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Ribavirin is one of the major agents used in combination therapy with interferon for chronic hepatitis C, but is often associated with hemolytic anemia as a serious adverse event. Employing metabolome analysis, we demonstrated that the concentrations of intermediate metabolites produced by glycolysis and the pentose phosphate cycle in patients' erythrocytes were significantly decreased after administration of ribavirin. Our findings suggest that hemolysis associated with ribavirin is triggered by an energy crisis and consequent oxidative stress, thus having implications for the prevention of such hemolysis.