Identifying patient-related predictors of permanent growth hormone deficiency.

Objective: Isolated childhood growth hormone deficiency (GHD) can persist into adulthood, and re-testing at the transition period is needed to determine whether continued growth hormone therapy is indicated. Here, our objective was to identify predictors of permanent GHD.

Design: Retrospective single-centre study of patients with childhood-onset GHD who were re-tested after adult height attainment.

Hormone Immunoassay Interference: A 2021 Update.

Immunoassays are powerful qualitative and quantitative analytical techniques. Since the first description of an immunoassay method in 1959, advances have been made in assay designs and analytical characteristics, opening the door for their widespread implementation in clinical laboratories. Clinical endocrinology is closely linked to laboratory medicine because hormone quantification is important for the diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis of endocrine disorders.

Influence of everolimus-based treatment on circulating regulatory T cells after liver transplantation: Comparative study with tacrolimus-based therapy.

Liver transplantation remains the only treatment for terminal liver diseases. However, immunosuppressive drugs required for allograft acceptance are toxic and may be responsible for severe side effects. Modulating the immune system to induce tolerance is a promising approach to reduce immunosuppressive regimen.

Exome sequencing for diagnosis of congenital hemolytic anemia.

Background: Congenital hemolytic anemia constitutes a heterogeneous group of rare genetic disorders of red blood cells. Diagnosis is based on clinical data, family history and phenotypic testing, genetic analyses being usually performed as a late step. In this study, we explored 40 patients with congenital hemolytic anemia by whole exome sequencing: 20 patients with hereditary spherocytosis and 20 patients with unexplained hemolysis.

Treatment with mTOR inhibitors after liver transplantation enables a sustained increase in regulatory T-cells while preserving their suppressive capacity.

Background: The mammalian targets of rapamycin (mTOR) inhibitors (sirolimus [SRL] and everolimus [EVR]) are used after transplantation for their immunosuppressive activity. Regulatory T-cells (Tregs) play a crucial role in immune tolerance. mTOR inhibitors appear to preserve Tregs, unlike Tacrolimus (Tac).

Troponin elevation in other conditions than acute coronary syndromes.

Troponin is a specific cardiac infarction isoform (TnIc, TnTc) and its determination is used for the diagnosis of myocardial infarction even with normal Electrocardiography. The increase of cardiac troponins occurs in a variety of clinical situations without an acute coronary syndrome (ACS), cardiologists and emergency physicians are often confronted with positive troponins that are difficult to interpret. Few data exist about the occurrence, the clinical characteristics and the predictive value in case of absence of ACS.

CD49b, a major marker of regulatory T-cells type 1, predicts the response to antiviral therapy of recurrent hepatitis C after liver transplantation.

The TRANSPEG study was a prospective study to assess the efficacy of antiviral therapy in patients with a recurrent hepatitis C virus (HCV) after liver transplantation. The influence of regulatory T-cells (Tregs) on the response to antiviral therapy was analyzed. Patients were considered as a function of their sustained virological response (SVR) at 18 months after treatment initiation.

Overexpression of Regulatory T Cells Type 1 (Tr1) Specific Markers in a Patient with HCV-Induced Hepatocellular Carcinoma.

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is an important causative agent of liver disease, but factors that determine the resolution or progression of infection are poorly understood. In this study, we suggested that existence of immunosuppressive mechanisms, supported by regulatory T cells and especially the regulatory T cell 1 subset (Tr1), may explain the impaired immune response during infection and thus the fibrosis aggravation to hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Using quantitative real-time PCR, we investigated the intra-hepatic presence of Tr1 cells in biopsies from a genotype 1b infected patient followed for an 18-year period from cirrhosis to HCC.

In vitro effects of cyclosporine A and tacrolimus on regulatory T-cell proliferation and function.

Background: Liver transplantation is the treatment of end-stage liver diseases, including hepatitis C. Immunosuppression prevents graft rejection but seems to accelerate the recurrence of hepatitis C. Regulatory T cells (Tregs) may be beneficial in tolerance but deleterious in recurrent hepatitis C.

IgG from patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension and/or systemic sclerosis binds to vascular smooth muscle cells and induces cell contraction.

Objectives: Pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) is characterised by remodelling of pulmonary arteries with enhanced vascular smooth muscle cell (VSMC) contraction, migration and proliferation. The authors investigated the presence of antibodies to human VSMCs in the serum of patients with systemic sclerosis with or without PAH and idiopathic PAH (iPAH).

Methods And Results: Antibodies to VSMCs were detected by immunofluorescence in sera from healthy controls and patients with scleroderma without PAH, scleroderma-associated PAH and iPAH.