A plain abdominal radiograph diagnosis of appendicitis.

Introduction: Despite reported poor sensitivity and specificity, plain abdominal radiographs have a role in the investigation of suspected appendicitis.

Presentation Of Case: We report a case of a previously healthy 47 year old man, who presented with sudden onset abdominal pain associated with a raised temperature. He gave a short history of pain around the umbilicus, which radiated to his right iliac fossa over a period of hours.

Temporal regulation of expression of immediate early and second phase transcripts by endothelin-1 in cardiomyocytes.

Background: Endothelin-1 stimulates Gq protein-coupled receptors to promote proliferation in dividing cells or hypertrophy in terminally differentiated cardiomyocytes. In cardiomyocytes, endothelin-1 rapidly (within minutes) stimulates protein kinase signaling, including extracellular-signal regulated kinases 1/2 (ERK1/2; though not ERK5), with phenotypic/physiological changes developing from approximately 12 h. Hypertrophy is associated with changes in mRNA/protein expression, presumably consequent to protein kinase signaling, but the connections between early, transient signaling events and developed hypertrophy are unknown.