Publications by authors named "Dikov T"

Angiogenesis, the natural mechanism by which fresh blood vessels develop from preexisting ones, is altered in arterial hypertension (AH), impacting renal function. Studies have shown that hypertension-induced renal damage involves changes in capillary density (CD), indicating alterations in vascularization. We aimed to elucidate the role of the apelin receptor (APLNR), neuronal nitric oxide synthase (nNOS), and vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) in hypertension-induced renal damage.

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With the growing popularity of winter sports, it is necessary to pay more attention to the types of traumatic injuries that a person can sustain in various incidents related to their practice. We present a case in which an adult man died as a result of a collision with a tree while skiing. Although the deaths are associated with different types and severity of craniocerebral injuries in the majority of the cases, here we are dealing with an abdominal injury with rupture of the stomach, pancreas, and left renal artery.

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Cutaneous mixed tumor is a rare benign neoplasm that exhibits a wide range of metaplastic changes and differentiation in the epithelial, myoepithelial, and stromal components, which is often confused with various other skin lesions. We present an unusual case of a 58-year-old woman with a mixed tumor of the upper lip, previously misdiagnosed as adnexal carcinoma on a preoperative biopsy. The excision biopsy shows a well-circumscribed lesion composed of various cells and structures featuring folliculo-sebaceous differentiation embedded in a prominent chondromyxoid stroma.

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Hypertension-induced renal injury is a multifactorial process which plays a crucial role in the development of chronic kidney disease. Multiple studies have demonstrated that interstitial rather than glomerular changes correlate better with renal functional capacity. Recent evidence indicates that mast cells and cell signaling proteins such as fibroblast growth factor-2 may contribute to the progression of interstitial changes under hypertensive conditions.

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The case report presented here describes the culturing and characterization of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) isolated from a primary indolent B-cell lymphoma, located in the CNS of an immunocompetent patient. The presence of such cells in the tumor mass can further elucidate the pathogenesis of the disease and reveal possible future approaches for its treatment. We present a case report of a 61-year-old immunocompetent woman who had an episode of confusion with numbness in the right leg and the right arm, slurred and dysarthric speech and urine incontinence.

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A 67-year-old woman presented with clinical symptoms, radiological findings, and preoperative work-up highly suggestive of advanced stage IV carcinoma of the gallbladder (CG). An extended cholecystectomy with the excision of adjacent liver segments and loco-regional lymphadenectomy was performed. Final pathology results revealed diffuse xanthogranulomatous cholecystitis (XG) with ruptured Rokitansky-Aschoff sinuses with tumor-resembling adenomyosis without atypical or malignant cells.

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Background: Although gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GISTs) are the most common mesenchymal tumors of the gastrointestinal tract, they comprise less than 1% of all gastrointestinal tumors. Neuroendocrine tumors (NET) of the gastro-enteropancreatic system are also rare, representing about 2% of all gastrointestinal neoplasms. Pancreatic localization of NET is extremely uncommon-these tumors are only 1-5% of all pancreatic cancers.

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Purpose: To provide an overview of the morphologic subtypes of ovarian carcinomas in Bulgaria in relation to current healthcare organization using Bulgarian National Cancer Registry data. Further, we investigated hospital volume as a factor influencing the quality of care for patients with ovarian cancer.

Methods: Bulgarian National Cancer Registry ovarian carcinoma data were retrieved (2009-2011) and distribution of histologic types was analyzed.

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Background/aim: The aim of our study was to elucidate the role of polymorphisms in AR, CYP1B1, CYP19, and SRD5A2 genes for prostate cancer (PC) development in Bulgarian patients.

Materials And Methods: We genotyped 246 PC patients and 261 controls (155 with benign prostate hyperplasia and 107 healthy population controls) using direct sequencing, PCR-RFLP, SSCP, and fragment analysis.

Results: The allele and genotype frequencies of most of the studied variants did not differ significantly between cases and controls.

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Background: Chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) is a hematological malignancy that originates in an abnormal pluripotent bone marrow stem cell. CML is consistently associated with the expression of the fusion gene, generated by the t(9;22) chromosomal translocation, thus creating the Philadelphia chromosome, a target for protein tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) therapy.  There is no published data, demonstrating increased risk for development of second cancers, associated with the exposure to TKIs.

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Background: IgG4-related disease (IgG4-RD) is a newly recognized disorder, characterized by massive IgG4+ lymphocyte and plasma cell infiltration, storiform fibrosis, causing enlargement, nodules or thickening of the various organs, simultaneously or metachronously. Involvement of the gastrointestinal tract is very rare and can be presented as a diffuse wall thickening or polyp or mass-like lesion. Up to now, there have been reported only a few cases of isolated gastric IgG4-RD.

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Angiogenesis is one of the six originally constituted hallmarks of cancer that has been extensively studied in the last two decades. The aim of our study is to assess the microvessel and macrophageal density in laryngeal carcinoma and its clinicopathological correlations. We immunohistochemically assessed microvessel density (CD34) and macrophage count (CD68) using microarray techniques and then looked for clinicopathological correlations.

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Background: About 3885 women are diagnosed with breast cancer and 1285 die from the disease each year in Bulgaria. However no genetic testing to identify the mutations in high-risk families has been provided so far.

Methods: We evaluated 200 Bulgarian women with primary invasive breast cancer and with personal/ family history of breast cancer for the presence of unequivocally damaging germline mutations in BRCA1/2 using Sanger sequencing.

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The aim of the present study was to determine the relative quantitative expression of hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF)-1α, -2α and -3α, and VEGF-A in laryngeal carcinoma. A total of 63 patients with carcinoma of the larynx were enrolled in the study. Total RNA was isolated from fresh, frozen normal and tumor tissues of each patient, and quantitative polymerase chain reaction was performed.

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In the current study, expression levels of let-7c, miR-30c, miR-141, and miR-375 in plasma from 59 prostate cancer (PC) patients with different clinicopathological characteristics and two groups of controls: 16 benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) samples and 11 young asymptomatic men (YAM) were analyzed to evaluate their diagnostic and prognostic value in comparison to prostate-specific antigen (PSA). miR-375 was significantly downregulated in 83.5% of patients compared to BPH controls and showed stronger diagnostic accuracy (area under the curve [AUC]=0.

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Objective: Mutations of the nucleophosmin (NPM1) gene are considered as the most frequent acute myeloid leukemia (AML)-associated genetic lesion, reported with various incidences in different studies, and type A (NPM1-A) is the most frequent type. However, since most series in the literature report on the features of all patients regardless of the type of mutation, NPM1-A(+) cases have not been well characterized yet. Therefore, we evaluated the prevalence of NPM1-A in Bulgarian AML patients and searched for an association with clinical and laboratory features.

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Purpose: Searching for diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers for prostate cancer (PC) is main public health priority. DNA methylation in body fluids is a stable, easily detectable and promising PC biomarker. The major advantages of urine-based assays are their noninvasive nature and the ability to monitor PC with heterogeneous foci.

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Unlabelled: The incidence of malignant and premalignant endocervical glandular lesions is increasing. Several research groups have recently used the protein p16 (INK4a) as a possible diagnostic biomarker of cervical cancer. The objects of study were to evaluate whether the specificity of p16 (INK4a) expression in is sufficient for distinguishing normal, dysplastic and neoplastic endocervical epithelium.

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