Association of baseline plasma des-acyl ghrelin level with the response to rikkunshito in patients with functional dyspepsia.

Background And Aim: We recently conducted a randomized placebo-controlled trial on the efficacy and safety of rikkunshito, a standardized Japanese herbal medicine, for the treatment of functional dyspepsia (FD). The present post-hoc study aimed to evaluate the differences in clinical characteristics between responders and non-responders among FD patients who received rikkunshito for 8 weeks.

Methods: Rikkunshito responders were defined by using a global patient assessment.

Gatifloxacin resistance and mutations in gyra after unsuccessful Helicobacter pylori eradication in Japan.

A high resistance rate (47.9%) to gatifloxacin (GAT; 8-methoxy fluoroquinolone) in Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) strains from 48 Japanese patients is observed after unsuccessful H.

Colonic blood flow responses in experimental colitis: time course and underlying mechanisms.

Human inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD) are associated with significant alterations in intestinal blood flow, the direction and magnitude of which change with disease progression. The objectives of this study were to determine the time course of changes in colonic blood perfusion that occur during the development of dextran-sodium-sulfate (DSS)-induced colonic inflammation and to address the mechanisms that may underlie these changes in blood flow. Intravital microscopy was used to quantify blood flow (from measurements of vessel diameter and red blood cell velocity) in different-sized submucosal arterioles of control and inflamed colons in wild-type (WT) mice.

Molecular determinants of the prothrombogenic phenotype assumed by inflamed colonic venules.

Although platelets have been implicated in the pathogenesis of human inflammatory bowel diseases, little is known about the magnitude of platelet accumulation in the inflamed bowel, what regulates this process, and its relevance to the overall inflammatory response. In this study, intravital video microscopy was used to monitor the trafficking of platelets and leukocytes and vascular permeability in colonic venules during the development of colonic inflammation induced by 3% dextran sodium sulfate (DSS). Blocking antibodies directed against different adhesion molecules as well as P-selectin-deficient mice were used to define the adhesive determinants of DSS-induced platelet recruitment.

Attenuated apoptosis in H. pylori-colonized gastric mucosa of Mongolian gerbils in comparison with mice.

Although gastric cancer formation with H. pylori in Mongolian gerbils was recently reported, the same inoculation procedure did not result in cancer formation in other animals such as mice. Disturbed regulation of apoptosis and cell proliferation are known to link the multistep process of carcinogenesis.