Objective: To assess the role of neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) before robot-assisted radical cystectomy (RARC) for patients with variant histology (VH) muscle-invasive bladder cancer (MIBC).
Methods: Retrospective review of 988 patients who underwent RARC (2004-2023) for MIBC. Primary outcomes included the utilization of NAC among this cohort of patients, frequency of downstaging, and discordance between preoperative and final pathology in terms of the presence of VH.
Background: Preoperative frailty has been associated with adverse postoperative outcomes. Additionally, low testosterone has been associated with physical frailty and cognitive decline. However, the impact of simultaneous frailty and low testosterone on surgical outcomes is understudied.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: The presence of psychiatric disorders in patients with cancer is associated with increased morbidity and poorer outcomes. We sought to determine the impact of a new bladder cancer diagnosis on the incidence of depression and anxiety.
Methods: We used a database of billing claims (MarketScan®) to identify patients newly diagnosed with bladder cancer between 2009 and 2018.
Objective: To compare operative outcomes between the dorsal lumbotomy (DL) and laparoscopic nephrectomy (LN) approaches for patients with end stage renal disease (ESRD) undergoing nephrectomy. DL operative technique is also described.
Materials And Methods: We performed a retrospective review of all patients undergoing DL nephrectomy at Emory University from 2008-2020.
Study Question: Can a consensus and evidence-driven set of terms and definitions be generated to be used globally in order to ensure consistency when reporting on infertility issues and fertility care interventions, as well as to harmonize communication among the medical and scientific communities, policy-makers, and lay public including individuals and couples experiencing fertility problems?
Summary Answer: A set of 283 consensus-based and evidence-driven terminologies used in infertility and fertility care has been generated through an inclusive consensus-based process with multiple stakeholders.
What Is Known Already: In 2006 the International Committee for Monitoring Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ICMART) published a first glossary of 53 terms and definitions. In 2009 ICMART together with WHO published a revised version expanded to 87 terms, which defined infertility as a disease of the reproductive system, and increased standardization of fertility treatment terminology.
Study Question: Can a consensus and evidence-driven set of terms and definitions be generated to be used globally in order to ensure consistency when reporting on infertility issues and fertility care interventions, as well as to harmonize communication among the medical and scientific communities, policy-makers, and lay public including individuals and couples experiencing fertility problems?
Summary Answer: A set of 283 consensus-based and evidence-driven terminologies used in infertility and fertility care has been generated through an inclusive consensus-based process with multiple stakeholders.
What Is Known Already: In 2006 the International Committee for Monitoring Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ICMART) published a first glossary of 53 terms and definitions. In 2009 ICMART together with WHO published a revised version expanded to 87 terms, which defined infertility as a disease of the reproductive system, and increased standardization of fertility treatment terminology.
Safer conception interventions reduce HIV incidence while supporting the reproductive goals of people living with or affected by HIV. We developed a consensus statement to address demand, summarize science, identify information gaps, outline research and policy priorities, and advocate for safer conception services. This statement emerged from a process incorporating consultation from meetings, literature, and key stakeholders.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn the United States, African-Americans' (AAs) HIV infection rates are higher than any other racial group, and AA men who have sex with women (MSW) are a significant proportion of new cases. There is little research into AA MSW HIV/AIDS knowledge, barriers, and facilitators of HIV testing in Chicago. We enrolled a convenience sample of AA MSW from a community health clinic who completed self-administered surveys assessing HIV knowledge and testing-related barriers and facilitators.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAir within the bladder wall, or bladder pneumatosis, is a very rare finding typically resulting from an infectious etiology, as in emphysematous cystitis (EC). However, there have been reports of bladder pneumatosis occurring without clear infectious origins. We present a case of a female patient found to have concurrent bladder and ileal pneumatosis secondary to a catastrophic vascular event.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: HIV-affected women and couples often desire children and many accept HIV risk in order to attempt pregnancy and satisfy goals for a family. Risk reduction strategies to mitigate sexual and perinatal HIV transmission include biomedical and behavioural approaches. Current efforts to integrate HIV and reproductive health services offer prime opportunities to incorporate strategies for HIV risk reduction during pregnancy attempts.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSeveral studies have shown that slopes of hills are greatly overestimated. We have recently demonstrated that the overestimates increase logarithmically as the end point of the domain to be estimated is increased. A theoretical analysis showed that a critical parameter is the angle between the observer's line of sight and the slope of the hill, when the observer fixates the far point of the required domain.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn neurons, calcium (Ca(2+) ) channels regulate a wide variety of functions ranging from synaptic transmission to gene expression. They also induce neuroplastic changes that alter gene expression following psychostimulant administration. Ca(2+) channel blockers have been considered as potential therapeutic agents for the treatment of methamphetamine (METH) dependence because of their ability to reduce drug craving among METH users.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: Current treatments for cancer pain are often inadequate, particularly when metastasis to bone is involved. The addition to the treatment regimen of another drug that has a complementary analgesic effect may increase the overall analgesia without the necessity to increase doses, thus avoiding dose-related side effects. This project investigated the synergistic effect of the addition of the potassium channel (KCNQ2-3) modulator flupirtine to morphine treatment in a rat model of prostate cancer-induced bone pain.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFProlactin (PRL) is the major hormonal mediator of adaptation to hyposmotic conditions. In tilapia (Oreochromis mossambicus), PRL cells are segregated to the rostral pars distalis of the anterior pituitary facilitating the nearly pure culture of dissociated PRL cells. Membrane capacitance (C(m)) was recorded at 1Hz or higher for tens of minutes as a surrogate monitor of PRL secretion by exocytosis from cells under perforated patch clamp.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: Leconotide (CVID, AM336, CNSB004) is an omega conopeptide similar to ziconotide, which blocks voltage sensitive calcium channels. However, unlike ziconotide, which must be administered intrathecally, leconotide can be given intravenously because it is less toxic. This study investigated the antihyperalgesic potency of leconotide given intravenously alone and in combinations with morphine-administered intraperitoneally, in a rat model of bone cancer pain.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSurveillance is a triennial worldwide compendium of national rules and regulations for assisted reproductive technology. It was last published in 2007.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: This study determined the antihyperalgesic effect of CNSB002, a sodium channel blocker with antioxidant properties given alone and in combinations with morphine in rat models of inflammatory and neuropathic pain.
Design: Dose response curves for nonsedating doses of morphine and CNSB002 given intraperitoneally alone and together in combinations were constructed for antihyperalgesic effect using paw withdrawal from noxious heat in two rat pain models: carrageenan-induced paw inflammation and streptozotocin (STZ)-induced diabetic neuropathy.
Results: The maximum nonsedating doses were: morphine, 3.
Objective: Leconotide is an omega-conotoxin that blocks neuronal voltage sensitive calcium channels. This study compared the antihyperalgesic potencies of leconotide and ziconotide given intravenously alone and in combinations with a potassium channel modulator flupirtine, given intraperitoneally, in a rat model of diabetic neuropathic pain.
Design: Rats were given streptozotocin (150 mg/kg ip) to induce diabetic neuropathy and hyperalgesia.
Objectives: This study is a case series that was designed to provide data on the efficacy and the incidence and duration of adverse effects of flupirtine in the treatment of cancer-related neuropathic pain.
Design: This was an 8-day, open-label study of palliative care patients with neuropathic pain despite maximal opioid treatment. They received an initial dose of flupirtine 100 mg orally four times daily (QID) that could be titrated.
Objectives: Flupirtine is an established clinical analgesic for mild to moderate musculoskeletal pain states. It has recently been shown to be a KCNQ2-3 potassium channel opener. These experiments were performed to see if this property could be useful in treating pain states characterized by central sensitization with the drug either given alone or in combination with morphine.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Worldwide more than 70 million couples suffer from infertility, the majority being residents of developing countries. Negative consequences of childlessness are experienced to a greater degree in developing countries when compared with Western societies. Bilateral tubal occlusion due to sexually transmitted diseases and pregnancy-related infections is the most common cause of infertility in developing countries, a condition that is potentially treatable with assisted reproductive technologies (ART).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWe describe an in utero model in which it is possible to investigate the involvement of supraspinal and spinal neurons in the genesis of spontaneous motor activity, a feature of early fetal life. To date almost all studies of the circuits that give rise to spontaneous motor activity during early ontogeny, and the neurotransmitters involved, have been carried out with in vitro models. Limitations of in vitro models include the relatively short viability of the preparation and the need to stimulate the nervous system either pharmacologically or electrically to produce the activity to be studied, in contrast to the activity that spontaneously occurs normally in utero.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Although the fetal sheep is a favoured model for studying the ontogeny of physiological control systems, there are no descriptions of the timing of arrival of the projections of supraspinal origin that regulate somatic and visceral function. In the early development of birds and mammals, spontaneous motor activity is generated within spinal circuits, but as development proceeds, a distinct change occurs in spontaneous motor patterns that is dependent on the presence of intact, descending inputs to the spinal cord. In the fetal sheep, this change occurs at approximately 65 days gestation (G65), so we therefore hypothesised that spinally-projecting axons from the neurons responsible for transforming fetal behaviour must arrive at the spinal cord level shortly before G65.
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