Surgical Emergencies in Rectal Cancer: A Narrative Review.

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the third most diagnosed cancer worldwide and the second most common cause of cancer death. About 20% of patients diagnosed with rectal cancer present with emergency symptoms. Typical symptoms include acute bleeding, obstruction, and perforation.

Different impact of a severe storm on two gorgonian species.

Extreme events influence ecosystem dynamics, but their effects on coastal marine habitats are often poorly perceived compared to their terrestrial counterparts. The detailed study of changes in benthic communities related to these phenomena is becoming urgent, due to the increasing intensity and frequency of hurricanes recorded in recent decades. Slow-growing benthic sessile organisms are particularly vulnerable to mechanical impacts, especially the large long-lived species with branched morphology that structure Mediterranean coralligenous assemblages.

Evaluation of the Performance of an Ocular Surface Modulator Containing ST-Lysyal Versus Hyaluronic Acid Eyedrops in Patients with Dry Eye Disease: A Pilot Study.

Introduction: Dry eye disease (DED) is a multifactorial condition of the ocular surface, primarily treated with tear substitutes, which do not fully restore natural tear functions. In this pilot study, we tested the hypothesis that T-Lysyal (T-Lys) improves symptoms and signs in patients with DED. Additionally, we provide a literature overview on the effects of T-Lys in ophthalmology and non-ophthalmology conditions to elucidate its mechanisms of action.

Genome-resolved metagenomics revealed novel microbial taxa with ancient metabolism from macroscopic microbial mat structures inhabiting anoxic deep reefs of a Maldivian Blue Hole.

Blue holes are vertical water-filled openings in carbonate rock that exhibit complex morphology, ecology, and water chemistry. In this study, macroscopic microbial mat structures found in complete anoxic conditions in the Faanu Mudugau Blue Hole (Maldives) were studied by metagenomic methods. Such communities have likely been evolutionary isolated from the surrounding marine environment for more than 10,000 years since the Blue Hole formation during the last Ice Age.

Intraoperative transcystic laparoscopic common bile duct stone clearance with SpyGlass™ discover during emergency and elective cholecystectomy: a single-center case series.

Background And Study Aim: The development of a new cholangioscope, the SpyGlass™ Discover (Boston Scientific), has allowed the laparoscopic transcystic common bile duct exploration and stone clearance. The possibility of simultaneous treatment of choledocholithiasis during early laparoscopic cholecystectomy offers the opportunity to enormously reduce the time between acute cholecystitis diagnosis and the execution of cholecystectomy with better outcomes for patients. Furthermore, an altered anatomy of the gastrointestinal tract is not an obstacle to this technique.

Patterns of change in coral reef communities of a remote Maldivian atoll revisited after eleven years.

Coral reefs are exposed worldwide to several global and local human pressures including climate change and coastal development. Assessing the effects of such pressures on coral reef communities and the changes they undergo over time is mandatory to understand their possible future trends. Nonetheless, some coral reefs receive no or little scientific attention, as in the case of Huvadhoo Atoll that is an under-studied region in the southernmost area of the Maldives (Indian Ocean).

Unexpected slow recovery of seagrass leaf epiphytes after the impact of a summer heat wave and concomitant mucilage bloom.

The epiphytes of seagrass leaves constitute a peculiar community, comprised of a number of species specialized for this living substrate. Several studies report on the response of epiphytes to different pressures but no information exists about the effects of summer heatwaves, which have become frequent events in the last decades. This paper represents the first attempt to investigate the change in the leaf epiphyte community of the Mediterranean seagrass Posidonia oceanica due to the heatwave occurred in summer 2003.

QUANTITATIVE ASSESSMENT OF AUTOMATED OPTICAL COHERENCE TOMOGRAPHY IMAGE ANALYSIS USING A HOME-BASED DEVICE FOR SELF-MONITORING NEOVASCULAR AGE-RELATED MACULAR DEGENERATION.

Purpose: To evaluate a prototype home optical coherence tomography device and automated analysis software for detection and quantification of retinal fluid relative to manual human grading in a cohort of patients with neovascular age-related macular degeneration.

Methods: Patients undergoing anti-vascular endothelial growth factor therapy were enrolled in this prospective observational study. In 136 optical coherence tomography scans from 70 patients using the prototype home optical coherence tomography device, fluid segmentation was performed using automated analysis software and compared with manual gradings across all retinal fluid types using receiver-operating characteristic curves.

Serpulid reefs and their role in aquatic ecosystems: A global review.

The Serpulidae are a large family of sedentary polychaetes, characterized by a calcareous habitation tube, which they cannot leave. The calcium carbonate tube is in the form of both aragonite and calcite, in fairly constant ratio for each taxon. Tubes are cemented firmly to any hard substrate (in only few species tubes are free).

Variability between observers does not hamper detecting change over time in a temperate reef.

Marine ecosystems are subject to global and local impacts, both contributing to dramatic changes in coastal communities. Assessing such changes requires time series or the revisitation of sites first surveyed in the past. In both cases, data are not necessarily collected by the same observers, which could lead to a bias in the results.

Eavesdropping on dolphins: Investigating the habits of bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) through fixed acoustic stations.

This study investigates the bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus, Montagu 1821) habitat use in the Portofino marine protected area (NW Italy) and adjacent waters, a core area for the dolphins and a highly touristic area in the Mediterranean Sea. A permanent automated real-time passive acoustic monitoring system, able to detect and track dolphins continuously, was tested in the area within the activities of the Life+ Nature project ARION. The habits of bottlenose dolphins was investigated considering the resident rate inside the area, which quantifies the amount of time dolphins spent in these waters, by means of random forest regression.

Benthic diversity patterns and predictors: A study case with inferences for conservation.

Understanding which drivers cause diversity patterns is a key issue in conservation. Here we applied a spatially explicit model to predict marine benthic diversity patterns according to environmental factors in the NW Mediterranean Sea. While most conservation-oriented diversity studies consider species richness only and neglect equitability, we measured separately species richness, equitability, and 'overall' diversity (i.

Organization Science improves management effectiveness of Marine Protected Areas.

The ecological management effectiveness (EME) of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) is the degree to which MPAs reach their ecological goals. The significant variability of EME among MPAs has been partly explained by MPA design, management and implementation features (e.g.

Regenerative Medicine and Diabetes: Targeting the Extracellular Matrix Beyond the Stem Cell Approach and Encapsulation Technology.

According to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF), almost 1. 25 million people in the United States (US) have type 1 diabetes, which makes them dependent on insulin injections. Nationwide, type 2 diabetes rates have nearly doubled in the past 20 years resulting in more than 29 million American adults with diabetes and another 86 million in a pre-diabetic state.

Long-term change in bioconstruction potential of Maldivian coral reefs following extreme climate anomalies.

Global climate change has increased the frequency and intensity of extreme heat anomalies and consequent mass coral bleaching events. Long-term dynamics of hard coral cover, bioconstruction potential, carbonate deposition, and reef accretion was monitored over a 20-year period on Maldivian coral reefs in order to investigate the effects of high-temperature anomalies on coral reef accretion and their recovery potential. Changes experienced by shallow reefs between 1997 and 2017 were evaluated by considering five different bioconstructional guilds and the BioConstruction Potential index (BCP), a proxy for the constructional capacity of reefs.

SCOTOPIC AND FAST MESOPIC MICROPERIMETRY IN EYES WITH DRUSEN AND RETICULAR PSEUDODRUSEN.

Purpose: To evaluate the feasibility in the clinical practice of a fast and simple mesopic microperimetry examination comparing the retinal sensitivity in eyes with drusen and reticular pseudodrusen by scotopic and mesopic testing.

Methods: In eyes with only drusen and only reticular pseudodrusen, retinal sensitivity was assessed by mesopic testing and after 35 minutes of dark adaptation by scotopic testing using 2 grids of 6 and 10 stimulus points.

Results: Fifteen eyes with drusen and 14 eyes with reticular pseudodrusen were enrolled with mean best-corrected visual acuity of 20/20.

Mediterranean Bioconstructions Along the Italian Coast.

Marine bioconstructions are biodiversity-rich, three-dimensional biogenic structures, regulating key ecological functions of benthic ecosystems worldwide. Tropical coral reefs are outstanding for their beauty, diversity and complexity, but analogous types of bioconstructions are also present in temperate seas. The main bioconstructions in the Mediterranean Sea are represented by coralligenous formations, vermetid reefs, deep-sea cold-water corals, Lithophyllum byssoides trottoirs, coral banks formed by the shallow-water corals Cladocora caespitosa or Astroides calycularis, and sabellariid or serpulid worm reefs.

Applying organization science to assess the management performance of Marine Protected Areas: An exploratory study.

Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are important tools to achieve marine conservation and resources management goals. The management effectiveness of MPAs (the degree to which MPAs achieve their goals) is highly variable and can be affected by many MPA attributes, for example their design, enforcement and age. Another key factor possibly affecting MPA management effectiveness is the management performance, here conceived according to Horigue et al.

Fish mitigate trophic depletion in marine cave ecosystems.

Dark marine habitats are often characterized by a food-limited condition. Peculiar dark habitats include marine caves, characterized by the absence of light and limited water flow, which lead to reduced fluxes of organic matter for cave-dwelling organisms. We investigated whether the most abundant and common cave-dwelling fish Apogon imberbis has the potential to play the role of trophic vector in Mediterranean marine caves.

A predictive approach to benthic marine habitat mapping: Efficacy and management implications.

The availability of marine habitats maps remains limited due to difficulty and cost of working at sea. Reduced light penetration in the water hampers the use of optical imagery, and acoustic methods require extensive sea-truth activities. Predictive spatial modelling may offer an alternative to produce benthic habitat maps based on complete acoustic coverage of the seafloor together with a comparatively low number of sea truths.

Thirty year ecosystem trajectories in a submerged marine cave under changing pressure regime.

Marine caves are unique and vulnerable habitats exhibiting high biodiversity and heterogeneity, but threatened by multiple global and local disturbances. Marine caves, although widely distributed along the Mediterranean coast, suffer for the lack of quantitative data on their structure and function, which hinder their conservation status assessment. Thanks to the availability of a nearly 30-year-long series of data (1986-2013), we evaluated ecosystem change in the Bergeggi marine cave (Ligurian Sea, NW Mediterranean), a cave with a complex shape and high habitat heterogeneity.

An integrated method to evaluate and monitor the conservation state of coralligenous habitats: The INDEX-COR approach.

A new method based on photographic sampling coupled with in situ observations was applied to 53 stations along the French Mediterranean coast, to assess the integrity of coralligenous reefs affected by different levels of anthropogenic pressure. The conservation state of the assemblages characterizing these habitats was then assessed by an index - the INDEX-COR - that integrates three metrics: (i) the sensitivity of the taxa to organic matter and sediment deposition, (ii) the observable taxonomic richness, and (iii) the structural complexity of the assemblages. The sensitivity of INDEX-COR was tested and showed good correlation with the Level of Pressure calculated for each station according to expert judgment and field observations.

Saving from unnecessary pancreaticoduodenectomy. Brunner's gland hamartoma: Case report on a rare duodenal lesion and exhaustive literature review.

Introduction: Brunner's gland hamartoma (BGH) is an infrequently encountered, benign, polypoid proliferation of Brunner's glands. Usually these lesions are asymptomatic, just only occasionally presenting with duodenal obstruction or bleeding signs and mimicking a tumoral lesion.

Case Presentation: A 72-year-old male, referred for recurrent vomiting and epigastralgia, was investigated and all preoperative findings were suggestive of a tumour of the duodenum.

An ecosystem-based approach to assess the status of Mediterranean algae-dominated shallow rocky reefs.

A conceptual model was constructed for the functioning the algae-dominated rocky reef ecosystem of the Mediterranean Sea. The Ecosystem-Based Quality Index (reef-EBQI) is based upon this model. This index meets the objectives of the EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive.

The two facets of species sensitivity: Stress and disturbance on coralligenous assemblages in space and time.

Marine coastal ecosystems are affected by a vast array of human-induced disturbances and stresses, which are often capable of overwhelming the effects of natural changes. Despite the conceptual and practical difficulty in differentiating between disturbance and stress, which are often used interchangeably, the two terms bear different ecological meanings. Both are external agents, but the former causes mortality or physical damage (subtraction of biomass), whereas the latter causes physiological alteration (reduction in productivity).