Migrant breast cancer patients and their participation in genetic counseling: results from a registry-based study.

Certain ethnic groups seem to have less access to cancer genetic counseling. Our study was to investigate the participation in cancer genetic counseling among migrant breast cancer patients of Turkish and Moroccan origin. Hospital medical records of Turkish and Moroccan and of a comparative group of non-Turkish/Moroccan newly diagnosed breast cancer patients were studied.

Aortoesophageal fistula successfully treated by endovascular stent-graft.

The case of a patient with an aortoesophageal fistula is presented, which was caused by ingestion of a chicken bone and was treated by endovascular stent-graft placement and esophagectomy with early reconstruction. The diagnostic and therapeutic options and challenges encountered in treating an aortoesophageal fistula are discussed.

Systemic inflammatory response in acute cholangitis and after subsequent treatment.

Objective: To measure the concentrations of endotoxin and inflammatory mediators during an attack of acute cholangitis and see what effect endoscopic treatment had on these mediators.

Design: Prospective study.

Setting: University teaching hospital The Netherlands.

Endotoxin, cytokines, and endotoxin binding proteins in obstructive jaundice and after preoperative biliary drainage.

Background: Obstructive jaundice is associated with postoperative complications related to increased endotoxaemia and the inflammatory response. In animals obstructive jaundice is associated with endotoxaemia and cytokine induction, which are reversed by internal biliary drainage.

Aims: To study endotoxaemia and the subsequent inflammatory response in obstructive jaundiced patients and after endoscopic biliary drainage.

Treatment with recombinant bactericidal/permeability-increasing protein to prevent endotoxin-induced mortality in bile duct-ligated rats.

Background: Operation in patients with obstructive jaundice is associated with substantial morbidity because of increased susceptibility to endotoxin (lipopolysaccharide) and the inflammatory cascade. Different interventions to reduce endotoxemia and cytokine induction, and resulting complications, have been studied. Bactericidal/permeability-increasing protein (BPI) is a naturally occurring endotoxin-binding protein produced in neutrophils.

Staging of ampullary and pancreatic carcinoma: comparison between endosonography and surgery.

Background: The aim of the study was to update our previously published data on the clinical TNM staging of ampullary and pancreatic carcinoma by endosonography.

Methods: Endosonography was performed in 70 patients with pancreatic cancer and in 32 patients with ampullary carcinoma. TNM staging was carried out before surgery and compared with findings of histology and/or surgery.

Inhibition of endotoxin-induced cytokine release and neutrophil activation in humans by use of recombinant bactericidal/permeability-increasing protein.

To investigate the effects of a recombinant endotoxin-binding protein, bactericidal/permeability-increasing protein (rBPI23), on cytokine release and neutrophil activation in endotoxemia in humans, 8 volunteers were challenged twice with endotoxin and concurrently received either rBPI23 or placebo in a randomized, placebo controlled, double-blind crossover study, rBPI23 treatment significantly lowered circulating endotoxin levels (P = .02) and resulted in a significant reduction in the release of tumor necrosis factor (TNF), soluble TNF receptors p55 and p75, interleukin (IL)-6, IL-8 (P < .01 for each), and IL-10 levels (P = .