J Res Med Sci
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Interleukin-6 (IL-6) is an important mediator in the acute phase of inflammatory diseases such as neuromyelitis optica (NMO) and multiple sclerosis (MS). The level of IL-6 is higher in cerebrospinal fluid and serum of NMO patients compare to MS. Vitamin D has a regulatory effect on IL-6, so it may have a negative correlation with IL-6 in the acute phase of these diseases. This study was performed to evaluate the serum levels of IL-6 and Vitamin D in NMO and MS patients at the onset of disease to find differences that may help in early diagnosis. ⋯ Our results showed that serum IL-6 levels were higher at the onset of NMO disease compared with MS. The serum levels of Vitamin D were low in both groups and there was no association between serum levels of Vitamin D and IL-6 in either group. Future studies with large sample size are needed to confirm these findings.
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Review
Cardiovascular implications of the COVID-19: Management of complications and drug safety concerns.
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, has rapidly spread worldwide and has been infected more than 219 million individuals with 4.55 million deaths worldwide as of September 2021, causing a pandemic. Preexisting cardiovascular (CV) comorbidities such as hypertension, diabetes, and coronary artery disease seem to be associated with greater severity of infection, worse prognosis, and higher mortality. Moreover, COVID-19 can contribute to CV complications, including acute myocardial injury, arrhythmia, acute coronary syndrome, and venous thromboembolism, emphasizing the importance of precocious detection and implementation of optimal therapeutic strategies. This review provides an overview of evidence-based data of CV complications of COVID-19, focusing on their management strategies, as well as potential cardiac adverse effects and drug interactions, due to off-label and investigational drugs used for the treatment of COVID-19.
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Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) is the most common and malignant brain tumor. The current standard of care is surgery followed by radiation therapy (RT). Radiotherapy treatment plan evaluation relies on radiobiological models for accurate estimation of tumor control probability (TCP). This study aimed to assess the impact of obtained magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data before and 12 weeks after RT to achieve the optimum TCP model to improve dose prescriptions in radiation therapy of GBM. ⋯ The results showed that among TCP radiobiological models, the optimum is the Poisson. The results also identified the importance of TCP radiobiological models in order to improve radiotherapy dose prescriptions.
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Uremic pruritus or chronic kidney disease-associated pruritus (CKD-aP) is a frequent compromising symptom in end-stage renal disease. Despite the little attention paid to drugs used among hemodialysis (HD) patients, investigating medications used in this population of patients and examining the status of CKD-aP may lead to the identification of medications that improve or worsen the pruritus condition. We aimed to assess the role of underlying diseases-related drugs on CKD-aP in HD patients. ⋯ Atorvastatin was associated with decreased frequencies of CKD-aP among HD patients in our study. This knowledge may guide further clinical trials to evaluate atorvastatin's immunomodulatory and anti-inflammatory effects on the CKD-aP in HD populations.