Lasers in Surgery and Medicine最新文献

Objectives: Cutaneous collagenous vasculopathy (CCV) is a rare, idiopathic microangiopathy marked by widespread telangiectasias and histologic vessel wall thickening. Due to its rarity and clinical overlap with other vascular conditions, CCV poses diagnostic and therapeutic challenges. This report highlights the successful use of pulsed dye laser (PDL) therapy in treating a case of extensive CCV.

Methods: A 40-year-old woman with a decade-long history of progressive telangiectasias involving the extremities, trunk, and forearms underwent treatment with a 595-nm PDL. Six treatment sessions were conducted over 14 months.

Results: The patient experienced significant improvement in erythema, telangiectasias, and associated discomfort, with sustained clinical response and substantial cosmetic benefit observed across all treated areas.

Conclusion: PDL is a safe and effective treatment for CCV, offering both symptomatic relief and cosmetic improvement. This case adds to limited existing literature supporting its use and highlights the importance of individualized laser parameters for optimal outcomes.

Background: Hemoporfin-mediated photodynamic therapy (PDT) is a high efficacy treatment alternative for port-wine stains (PWS) patients, and PDT also induced eczematous dermatitis in treated areas. However, the effect of PDT treatment on the prevalence and risk of dermatitis in patients with PWS have not been reported.

Purpose: To assess the association between PDT and dermatitis incidence and to investigate the mechanism of PDT-triggered dermatitis in PWS patients.

Patients and methods: A total of 512 PWS patients who received hemoporfin-mediated PDT treatment between June 2020 and September 2022 at the dermatology department of Wuhan No.1 Hospital were recruited in this study. Clinical images were used to calculate the percentage of dermatitis in treated areas. The arithmetic mean roughness (Ra), the average depth of roughness (Rz) and the mean square roughness (Rq) were used to assess the change of surface roughness. Transepidermal water loss (TEWL), stratum corneum hydration (SCH) and total lipid content (TLC) were used to analyze the skin barrier function.

Results: After treatment, we found that 27.15% (139/512) of PWS patients developed dermatitis on the treated areas, and the percentage of dermatitis was closely related to the treatment times and age of the patient. Moreover, these treated areas also exhibited markedly increased skin roughness (Ra, Rz, Rq; p < 0.05) and impaired barrier function, evidenced by significantly elevated TEWL and TLC (p < 0.05) and reduced SCH (p < 0.05).

Conclusion: PDT caused skin barrier dysfunction in PWS patients, which may lead to increased permeability of the epidermis and contribute to the dermatitis development.

Objectives: The movement of cilia in the fallopian tubes (FTs) facilitates important processes involved in fertility, and abnormalities in cilia function are linked with diseases including endometriosis and pelvic inflammatory disease. For the first time, we demonstrate the use of optical coherence tomography (OCT) to create depth-resolved mapping of motile cilia locations and quantify cilia beat frequency (CBF) in human FT samples ex vivo.

Methods: Segments of the FT ampulla were acquired from five patients following salpingectomy under an IRB approved protocol. The samples were longitudinally opened to expose the luminal surface for imaging. A sequence of at least 500 OCT images were acquired at 5-10 locations on each sample. To define the location of the motile cilia in the images, pixel-wise Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) analysis of intensity fluctuations with a sliding temporal window was performed on each image sequence. The frequencies corresponding to the physiological range of CBF (2-10 Hz) were selected for mapping, while the part of the FFT spectrum at higher frequencies (> 23 Hz) was used to define the noise threshold. The frequency with the highest FFT amplitude for each supra-threshold pixel was considered the CBF for this pixel and used to create a color-coded CBF map. The CBF map was overlaid with the OCT intensity image sequences to reveal cilia locations. Frequency histograms from the sliding window were examined to assess temporal consistency of the mapping and evaluate movement artifacts.

Results: OCT image sequences clearly showed the structure of FT plicae. The ciliated epithelium was obvious as a "shimmering" (rapidly changing intensity) layer atop plicae. Colored pixels on CBF maps visually aligned to these shimmering regions. Frequency histograms revealed that the image sequence peak CBF could be robustly determined, even in the presence of outliers attributable to table vibrations or bulk sample movement.

Conclusions: OCT can provide depth-resolved maps of CBF in human ex vivo FT tissue. Potentially, this technique can aid in understanding cilia dynamics in the normal human FT over the menstrual cycle and across age, as well as in diseases that affect the FTs. Future work will be directed toward in vivo implementation including miniaturization and robust motion compensation.

Background: The efficacy and safety of microneedle radiofrequency (MRF) for antiaging skin treatment has already been demonstrated. This study aims to, for the first time, comprehensively interpret the short and long-term effects of MRF by combining histology, high-throughput molecular analysis, and clinical evaluation.

Methods: At 1, 3, and 6 months after MRF in different parameters, the skin samples were taken for HE staining, Masson staining, and Victoria blue staining to observe the overall histological changes. Real-time PCR and WB were used to evaluate the quantitative changes of collagen I and III, MMP-2 and TGF-β1 at the different time periods. After transcriptome sequencing, bioinformatics analysis was performed to identify important biological processes related to skin after MRF treatment. At the same time, patients who had undergone facial MRF treatment in our department between 2020 and 2023 were collected for clinical review within half a year after treatment. Patient satisfaction score and Global Aesthetic Improvement Scale (GAIS) were collected.

Results: The histological sections showed that collagen and elastic fibers regenerated and the density increased after MRF. The mRNA and protein levels of collagen in each treatment group also showed an upward trend after treatment, especially in Group A. However, there was no significant difference among the treatment groups and compared with the blank control group. Transcriptome analysis showed that the differentially expressed genes were significantly enriched in collagen regeneration-related pathways at 1 month after treatment, then gradually decreased at 6 months. The clinical data showed that after MRF treatment, patients mainly rated the effect of skin rejuvenation as "3 - satisfied." The GAIS score showed that the long-term effect after MRF was better than the short-term effect (p = 0.040).

Conclusions: MRF can stimulate collagen rearrangement and rejuvenation in facial rejuvenation. The long-term rejuvenation effect of MRF can last at least 6 months and is better than the short-term effect.

Objectives: Advances in improving existing noninvasive optical diagnostic methods and creating new criteria for assessing the effects of diabetes on tissues and the vascular system are highly demanded. One of the promising, noninvasive and contactless methods for visualizing the vascular system is laser speckle contrast imaging. This study studies the possibility of using magnetic resonance contrast agents in laser speckle contrast imaging and optical coherence tomography, for the first time, on rat ears, under conditions of alloxan-induced type 1 diabetes. By combining diagnostic techniques, the study investigated the ability to differentiate between healthy rat tissue and diabetic rat tissue based on dynamic and structural changes caused by local application of magnetic resonance agents.

Methods: This study explores the possibility of using magnetic resonance contrast agents for laser speckle-contrast imaging and optical coherence tomography of rat ears under conditions where alloxan-induced type 1 diabetes mellitus is developing was studied for the first time.

Results: Kinetics of scattering coefficient (µ_s) for healthy and diabetic rats during optical clearing were evaluated. The most significant reduction is seen with the Gadovist solution, showing decreases of 18.6% and 16.1% for healthy and diabetic rats, respectively. Magnevist induced a smaller reduction in the µ_s, with decreases of 12.6% and 6.8%, respectively. Data on the flow rate in the vessels of the ears of laboratory rats obtained in the diabetic group demonstrate reduced indicators, relative to the healthy group of animals.

Conclusions: These results confirm the effectiveness of magnetic resonance contrast agents as optical clearing agents for both optical coherence tomography and laser speckle contrast imaging. For the first time, the nature of the change in the contrast of the static part with a change in scattering was studied. This is an additional application for studying the efficiency of optical clearing, and contributes to the multimodal application of speckle imaging methods.