Quantification of Internal Medicine Resident Inpatient Care Using the Diagnosis Procedure Combination Database.

Objective Quantification of patient encounters during internal medicine residency training is challenging. At present, there are no established strategies for evaluating the whole inpatient experience in Japan. We hypothesized that the Diagnosis Procedure Combination (DPC) database, which is widely used in Japan, might be a useful tool for such an evaluation.

Myostatin regulates proliferation and extracellular matrix mRNA expression in NIH3T3 fibroblasts.

The aim of this study was to clarify the effects of myostatin, which is a negative regulator of skeletal muscle mass, on the proliferation of NIH3T3 fibroblasts and the synthesis of extracellular matrix (ECM) by them. A proliferation assay revealed that myostatin attenuated cell growth at any of the doses used. High doses of myostatin strongly inhibited cell proliferation.