[Stem cells in regenerative medicine - from bench to bedside].

The use of mesenchymal stem cells for regenerative medicine is becoming more popular than ever before - even though their clinical usage is limited. Many ethical and translational questions, as well as legal aspects and uncertainty regarding safety inhibit the growth of appropriate therapies from promising scientific approaches.This paper demonstrates the main problems of the translation from stem cell based therapies from basic science towards their clinical use.

Social Media Marketing: What Do Prospective Patients Want to See?

Background: Platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ have created a worldwide audience of almost 3 billion people. Society is dramatically changing, demanding evolution of marketing strategies by plastic surgeons and aesthetic doctors alike. This unknown territory provides excellent opportunities, but creates many pitfalls as well; uncertainty remains as to the most effective manner to promote one's practice/services.

Deficiency of epidermal protein-bound omega-hydroxyceramides in atopic dermatitis.

Atopic dermatitis is a common skin disease of unknown etiology with an impaired permeability barrier function. To learn more about the molecular pathology in lesional skin, we analyzed levels of free extractable as well as protein-bound barrier lipids in the epidermis of atopic dermatitis subjects. The amount of protein-bound omega-hydroxyceramides in healthy epidermis comprised 46-53 wt% of total protein-bound lipids, whereas this percentage was decreased to 23-28 wt% in nonlesional areas and even down to 10-25 wt% in affected atopic skin areas of the subjects.

Risk factors for lethal outcome in patients with bullous pemphigoid: low serum albumin level, high dosage of glucocorticosteroids, and old age.

Background: Although bullous pemphigoid (BP) is the most frequent autoimmune bullous disease and is associated with a considerable case-fatality rate, little is known about factors that influence its prognosis.

Objective: To identify prognostic factors for lethal outcome in the first year after the initial hospitalization in patients with BP.

Design: A multicenter retrospective cohort study.