Normative values for esophageal functional lumen imaging probe measurements: A meta-analysis.

Background: The functional lumen imaging probe (Endoflip™) is increasingly used for evaluation of patients with esophageal symptoms. To improve the interpretation of Endoflip™ in clinical practice, normative values with appropriate cut-off values are required.

Methods: Original clinical studies describing Endoflip™ use for measurements of esophageal motility in healthy adults were considered.

Cancer cell sensitization and improved treatment efficacy by combined sodium butyrate and paclitaxel formulations is cancer-type specific.

We queried whether cancer treatment by combinations of paclitaxel and butyrate - free or formulated in drug delivery systems - can improve therapeutic responses compared to each drug alone. Combination treatments were conducted with HT-29 and HeLa cells, as representatives of differentiation-induced and cell-death-induced cancer lines, respectively. Pre-treatment of the HT-29 cells with butyrate (at doses inducing differentiation), followed by butyrate+paclitaxel generated changes in cell cycle profile, increased the level of dead cells beyond that of each drug alone, and allowed reduction in paclitaxel doses.

Novel steroid carbamates reverse multidrug-resistance in cancer therapy and show linkage among efficacy, loci of drug action and P-glycoprotein's cellular localization.

P-glycoprotein (Pgp) is a major ABC transporter responsible for multidrug-resistance (MDR) in cancer chemotherapy. Pre-clinical MDR modulation studies identified promising chemosensitizers, but none are in the clinic yet. Two novel progesterone-derived carbamates (11-carbamic acid N,N-dibenzyl progesterone ester and 11-carbamic acid N,N-dibutyl progesterone ester) were examined as potential chemosensitizers in the Pgp-expressing human colon cancer line HCT-15, applying the classical MDR-drugs paclitaxel and doxorubicin.

Treatment of resistant human colon cancer xenografts by a fluoxetine-doxorubicin combination enhances therapeutic responses comparable to an aggressive bevacizumab regimen.

Pre-clinical studies of multidrug resistance (MDR) usually address severe resistance, yet moderate MDR is already clinically-impeding. The purpose of this study was to characterize moderate drug resistance in human colon cancer, and it's modulation by fluoxetine. In vitro fluoxetine enhanced doxorubicin's cytotoxicity (10-fold), increased doxorubicin's intracellular accumulation (32%) and decreased efflux of intracellular doxorubicin (70%).