Acute acalculous cholecystitis as an early manifestation of COVID-19: case report and literature review.

Background: The novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has rapidly spread worldwide since the outbreak in Wuhan, China, in 2019, becoming a major threat to public health. The most common symptoms are fever, dry cough, shortness of breath, but subjects with COVID-19 may also manifest gastrointestinal symptoms, and in a few cases an involvement of the gallbladder has been observed. Case report: Here we present a case of 50-year-old male with SARS-CoV-2 infection who had abdominal pain, vomiting and diarrhea without respiratory symptoms and was finally diagnosed as acute acalculous cholecystitis (AAC).

Performance of genotypic tropism testing on proviral DNA in clinical practice: results from the DIVA study group.

Objective: The DIVA study is aimed at setting up a standardized genotypic tropism-testing on proviral-DNA for the routine clinical diagnostic-laboratory.

Methods: Twelve local centres and 5 reference centres (previously cross-validated) were identified. For inter-center validation-procedure, 60 peripheral-blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) aliquots from 45 HAART-treated patients were randomly chosen for population V3 sequencing on proviral-DNA at local HIV centre and at reference-laboratory.

Vacuum-assisted closure device enhances recovery of critically ill patients following emergency surgical procedures.

Introduction: Critically ill surgical patients frequently develop intra-abdominal hypertension (IAH) leading to abdominal compartment syndrome (ACS) with subsequent high mortality. We compared two temporary abdominal closure systems (Bogota bag and vacuum-assisted closure (VAC) device) in intra-abdominal pressure (IAP) control.

Methods: This prospective study with a historical control included 66 patients admitted to a medical and surgical intensive care unit (ICU) of a tertiary care referral center (Careggi Hospital, Florence, Italy) from January 2006 to April 2009.

Bedside diagnostic laparoscopy to diagnose intraabdominal pathology in the intensive care unit.

Introduction: Delayed diagnosis of intraabdominal pathology in the intensive care unit (ICU) increases rates of morbidity and mortality. Intraabdominal pathologies are usually identified through presenting symptoms, clinical signs, and laboratory and radiological results; however, these could also delay diagnosis because of inconclusive laboratory tests or imaging results, or the inability to safely transfer a patient to the radiology room. In the current study we evaluated the safety and accuracy of bedside diagnostic laparoscopy to confirm the presence of intraabdominal pathology in an ICU setting.

Totally endoscopic subxiphoid pericardioscopy: early steps with a new surgical tool.

Background: Pericardial pathology still has challenging diagnostic and treating issues. To reduce surgical trauma and pain for the patient, the authors developed a totally endoscopic echo-guided approach for both diagnostic and operative pericardioscopy.

Methods: Three steps moved from animal model (8 pigs) through concomitant open-chest interventions (7 patients) to closed-chest interventions for 10 patients with a diagnosis of severe pericardial effusion.

Adrenal incidentaloma: the influence of a decision-making algorithm on the short-term outcome of laparoscopy.

Background: At the present time, the precise indications for laparoscopic surgery of adrenal incidentaloma (AI) have yet to be completely clarified. The most controversial issue is the role of laparoscopy in the treatment of potentially malignant and large adrenal masses. Trying to address these questions, we retrospectively examined a group of patients with AIs.

Expression of cAMP response element-binding protein and sodium iodide symporter in benign non-functioning and malignant thyroid tumours.

Objective: Reduced expression or defective targeting of the sodium/iodide symporter (NIS) to the cell membrane in thyroid tumours has been reported. The expression of the NIS gene is up-regulated by TSH through the cAMP pathway and the characterization of the promoter region of the rat NIS gene revealed the existence of a degenerate cAMP response element (CRE) sequence. The cAMP-dependent transcription factor cAMP response element-binding protein (CREB) binds to CRE acting, upon phosphorylation, as a transcriptional activator.