Biomedical reports最新文献

Cervical lesions can be caused by pathogens, hormonal changes or by cervical injury. The recommended treatment in all cases is excision. Local re-epithelialization therapy should be initiated preoperatively and postoperatively. The present study assessed the post-market performance and tolerability of Cerviron^® ovules in the treatment and management of cervical lesions postoperatively. The study population included 345 participants aged 20-70 years with either a cervical lesion under treatment or with recent surgical removal of a cervical lesion. The degree of re-epithelialization of the cervical mucosa was improved in 73.17% of the patients evaluated during routine colposcopy exams and 92.73% of patients recorded no bleeding. When adding Cerviron^® either as monotherapy or in association with other antimicrobials in postoperative care of the cervical ectropion, improved postoperative outcomes such as reduced post-interventional bleeding and a superior quality of healing were observed. The study and its details are registered in www.clinicaltrials.gov under ID NCT05668806.

Breast cancer (BC) is the most common cancer in women worldwide, with 2.3 million cases recorded in 2020. Despite improvements in cancer treatment, patients with BC still succumb to the disease, due to regional and distant metastases when diagnosed at later stages. Several immune checkpoint inhibitors have been approved for BC treatment, based on their expression and role in maintaining immunosurveillance against tumors. The present study aimed to evaluate the expression of 12 immune checkpoints in patients with BC, and assess their role as diagnostic and therapeutic markers. Expression levels were measured using reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction. Among the 12 immune markers, herpesvirus entry mediator (HVEM) was found to be significantly upregulated in patients with malignant BC compared to non-malignant controls, with a relative fold change (FC) of 1.46 and P=0.012. A similar finding was observed for cytotoxic T-lymphocyte-associated antigen 4 (CTLA4; FC=1.47 and P=0.035). In addition, receiver operating characteristic curve analysis revealed that HVEM expression allowed significant differentiation between groups, with an area under the curve of 0.74 (P=0.013). Upregulation in both HVEM and CTLA4 was revealed to be significantly associated with the human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 (HER2)-enriched phenotype (FC=3.53, P=0.009 and FC=5.98, P=0.002, respectively), while only HVEM was significantly associated with the triple-negative phenotype (FC=2.07, P=0.016). Furthermore, HVEM was significantly higher in patients with grade III tumors (FC=1.88, P=0.025) and negative vascular invasion (FC=1.67, P=0.046) compared with non-malignant controls. Serum protein levels were assessed by multiplex immunoassay, and a significant increase in HVEM was detected in patients with malignant BC compared with that in non-malignant controls (P=0.035). These data indicated that HVEM may serve as a potential biomarker and target for immunotherapy, especially for certain types of BC.

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is an autoimmune disease involving several organs. Neutropenia in patients with SLE may be a factor associated with infection leading to higher morbidity and mortality. There are several inconsistent predictors of neutropenia in patients with SLE. The present study is a retrospective, analytical study, which aimed to identify other predictors of neutropenia in patients with SLE. Patients with SLE who had been regularly followed up for ≥1 year were included in this study. Clinical factors, including history of disease, comorbidities, previous infection, laboratory results and treatment, were collected. The primary analyzed indicator was the occurrence of neutropenia. Factors associated with neutropenia were calculated by multivariate logistic regression analysis. A total of 84 patients met the study criteria. Of those 84 patients, 36 (42.86%) developed neutropenia. There were seven factors placed in the predictive model for neutropenia. Two factors were independently associated with the presence of neutropenia: Disease duration and herpes zoster infection. The first factor was negatively related with neutropenia with an adjusted odds ratio of 0.70 (95% confidence interval, 0.54, 0.92), whereas herpes zoster infection was an independent risk factor for neutropenia with an adjusted odds ratio of 8.46 (95% confidence interval, 1.30, 54.80). In conclusion, the present study revealed that short duration of disease and herpes zoster infection are predictors of neutropenia in patients with SLE.

Recently, artificial intelligence (AI) has been applied in various fields due to the development of new learning methods, such as deep learning, and the marked progress in computational processing speed. AI is also being applied in the medical field for medical image recognition and omics analysis of genomes and other data. Recently, AI applications for videos of minimally invasive surgeries have also advanced, and studies on such applications are increasing. In the present review, studies that focused on the following topics were selected: i) Organ and anatomy identification, ii) instrument identification, iii) procedure and surgical phase recognition, iv) surgery-time prediction, v) identification of an appropriate incision line, and vi) surgical education. The development of autonomous surgical robots is also progressing, with the Smart Tissue Autonomous Robot (STAR) and RAVEN systems being the most reported developments. STAR, in particular, is currently being used in laparoscopic imaging to recognize the surgical site from laparoscopic images and is in the process of establishing an automated suturing system, albeit in animal experiments. The present review examined the possibility of fully autonomous surgical robots in the future.

The prognostic value of ring finger protein 215 (RNF215) in colorectal cancer (CRC) is unclear. Herein, the present study aimed to investigate the precise value of RNF215 based on CRC datasets from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and clinical cases. CRC patient data was collected from TCGA and clinical samples from the Department of Pathology, Shanghai Fifth People's Hospital, Fudan University (Shanghai, China). Logistic regression analysis was used to investigate the correlations between RNF215 and clinicopathological characteristics. The predictive value of RNF215 for the clinical outcome of CRC was determined using Kaplan-Meier curves and Cox regression. Gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA), single-sample GSEA (ssGSEA), and angiogenesis analysis were also conducted to investigate the biological role of RNF215. Immunohistochemistry was conducted to validate the results. The results of the present study confirmed that RNF215 protein expression was significantly associated with age, lymphatic invasion, and overall survival (OS). Univariate analysis showed that upregulation of RNF215 in CRC was significantly associated with age and lymphatic invasion. Kaplan-Meier survival analysis revealed that high RNF215 expression predicted poorer OS and disease-specific survival. A total of nine experimentally detected RNF215-binding proteins were identified with the STRING tool and Cytoscape software. GSEA suggested that RNF215 was associated with several important pathways involved in tumor occurrence, including the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes MAPK signaling pathway and the WikiPathway RAS signaling pathway. ssGSEA confirmed that RNF215 was significantly expressed in natural killer cells, CD8 T cells and T helper cells. Angiogenesis analysis revealed that numerous angiogenesis-related genes had the same expression trend as RNF215 in CRC. The immunostaining results indicated that RNF215 expression was significantly higher in CRC tissues than in corresponding normal tissues. In conclusion, increased RNF215 expression may be a potential molecular marker predictive of poor survival and a treatment target in CRC. In addition, RNF215 may participate in the formation of CRC through a variety of signaling pathways.

ETS variant transcription factor 6 (ETV6)-neurotrophic receptor tyrosine kinase 3 (NTRK3) (EN) fusions are typically found in rare diseases, such as primary renal fibrosarcoma (only six cases have been reported), secretory carcinoma of the breast and salivary gland (1 case), and AML (4 cases). Few cases have been reported, and expression of the EN gene fusion requires additional clinical data and fundamental research to be supported. The aim of the present study was to determine the inhibitory effect of Andrographis paniculata methanol extract (MeAP) on EN-related cell lines, IMS-M2 and BaF3/EN, as well as evaluate the mechanism of action. Vero cells were used as control cells. Trypan blue staining and MTT were used to evaluate the inhibitory effect of MeAP on tested cells. Western blotting and immunoprecipitation were used to detect the activation of EN after MeAP treatment. The IC₅₀ values of MeAP were found to be 12.38±0.57 µg/ml (IMS-M2) and 13.06±0.49 µg/ml (BaF3/EN). MeAP was observed to inhibit cell proliferation in a time, dose, and cell density-dependent manner. The IC₅₀ value for MeAP in Vero cells was markedly higher, at 109.97±4.24 (µg/ml), indicating a much less sensitive effect. Furthermore, MeAP treatment inhibited EN phosphorylation and induced apoptosis in these cells. Collectively, the present study demonstrated that MeAP has an oncogenic effect on EN fusion-positive cell lines, in particular.

Acute pancreatitis is characterized as an inflammatory illness that is life-threatening and causes necrosis as well as simple edema when pancreatic enzymes are activated intraglandularly. It is not known whether severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 causes acute pancreatitis. Patients with acute pancreatitis who test positive for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) frequently have biliary or alcoholic causes. It is unclear how common acute pancreatitis is in patients with COVID-19. By contrast with patients without COVID-19, however, COVID-19-positive patients with acute pancreatitis have a higher mortality as well as a higher risk of necrosis and admission to an intensive care unit. The most common cause of mortality in COVID-19-positive individuals with concurrent severe pancreatitis is acute respiratory distress syndrome. The present study discussed research on the link between COVID-19 infection and acute pancreatitis.

Vaccination against hepatitis B virus (HBV) remains the most effective strategy against HBV infection in humans. The present review summarized the optimal vaccination strategies against HBV in childhood. The following points are discussed: i) When and how the first HBV vaccines were developed; ii) the dosages, schedules and injection routes that are used for HBV vaccination; iii) the contraindications for HBV vaccination in the general paediatric population; iv) the challenges with the use of multivalent vaccines; v) the long-term immunogenicity and duration of protection against HBV; vi) the use of selective HBV vaccination and the hepatitis B immune globulin strategy in HBV-exposed infants; and vii) the effectiveness of the current HBV vaccination schemes. The present review is based on a Paediatric Virology Study Group (PVSG) webinar performed in the context of the 8th Workshop on Paediatric Virology.

Gemcitabine is a chemotherapeutic agent for pancreatic cancer treatment. It has also been demonstrated to inhibit human pancreatic cancer cell lines, MIA PaCa-2 and PANC-1. The aim of the present study was to investigate the suppressive effect of fucoxanthin, a marine carotenoid, in combination with gemcitabine on pancreatic cancer cells. MTT assays and cell cycle analysis using flow cytometry were performed to study the mechanism of action. The results revealed that combining a low dose of fucoxanthin with gemcitabine enhanced the cell viability of human embryonic kidney cells, 293, while a high dose of fucoxanthin enhanced the inhibitory effect of gemcitabine on the cell viability of this cell line. In addition, the enhanced effect of fucoxanthin on the inhibitory effect of gemcitabine on PANC-1 cells was significant (P<0.01). Fucoxanthin combined with gemcitabine also exerted significant enhancement of the anti-proliferation effect in MIA PaCa-2 cells in a concentration dependent manner (P<0.05), compared with gemcitabine treatment alone. In conclusion, fucoxanthin improved the cytotoxicity of gemcitabine on human pancreatic cancer cells at concentrations that were not cytotoxic to non-cancer cells. Thus, fucoxanthin has the potential to be used as an adjunct in pancreatic cancer treatment.

The present study aimed to demonstrate the proportion of the programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) expression in penile cancer patients and the association with clinicopathological parameters. Formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded specimens were obtained from 43 patients with primary penile squamous cell carcinoma treated at Srinagarind Hospital, Faculty of Medicine, Khon Kaen University, between 2008 and 2018. PD-L1 expression was evaluated by the immunohistochemistry using an SP263 monoclonal antibody. PD-L1 positivity was defined as >25% tumor cell staining or >25% tumor-associated immune cell staining. The correlation between PD-L1 expression and clinicopathological parameters was analyzed. A total of eight of 43 patients (18.6%) were identified as positive for PD-L1 expression in tumor cells and tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes. In the PD-L1 positive group, there was a significant association with pathological T stage (P=0.014) with a higher percentage of PD-L1 positive tumors in T1 stage compared with T2-T4 stage. In this cohort, there was a trend towards longer survival in patients with positive PD-L1 expression (5-year OS: 75% vs. 61.2%, P=0.19). Lymph node involvement and the location of tumor at the shaft of penis were two independent prognostic factors for survival. In conclusion, the PD-L1 expression was detected in 18% of penile cancer patients and high expression of PD-L1 was associated with the early T stage.