CT Fluoroscopic-Guided Coil Localization of Lung Nodules prior to Video-Assisted Thoracoscopic Surgical Resection Reduces Complications Compared to Hook Wire Localization.

Purpose: To compare the safety and efficacy of hook wire versus microcoil localization of pulmonary nodules prior to video-assisted thoracoscopic resection (VATS).

Materials And Methods: A retrospective comparative review was conducted of 46 patients (26 hook wire and 20 microcoil) who underwent computed tomography fluoroscopic-guided nodule localizations prior to VATS in a single center between January 2012 and August 2016. Nodule characteristics, procedural details, clinical outcomes, and pathologic findings were collected.

Duplex Ultrasound Versus Clinical Surveillance in the Prediction of TIPS Malfunction Placed for Refractory Ascites: Is Ultrasound Surveillance Useful?

Purpose: Since the advent of expanded polytetrafluoroethylene-covered stents and the improved patency they confer for transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (TIPS), the need to perform ultrasound surveillance has been debated. Prior reports have failed to separately evaluate patients who had TIPS placed for refractory ascites and variceal bleeding. The difference in morbidity from TIPS malfunction between these cohorts argues for distinction between the two.

Melanoma expression of matrix metalloproteinase-23 is associated with blunted tumor immunity and poor responses to immunotherapy.

Background: Matrix metalloproteinase-23 (MMP-23) can block the voltage-gated potassium channel Kv1.3, whose function is important for sustained Ca(2+) signaling during T cell activation. MMP-23 may also alter T cell activity and phenotype through cleavage of proteins affecting cytokine and chemokine signaling.

Enhanced immunohistochemical detection of neural infiltration in primary melanoma: is there a clinical value?

Neural infiltration in primary melanoma is a histopathologic feature that has been associated with desmoplastic histopathologic subtype and local recurrence in the literature. We tested the hypothesis that improved detection and characterization of neural infiltration into peritumoral or intratumoral location and perineural or intraneural involvement could have a prognostic relevance. We studied 128 primary melanoma cases prospectively accrued and followed at New York University using immunohistochemical detection with antihuman neurofilament protein and routine histology with hematoxylin and eosin.

Melanoma risk loci as determinants of melanoma recurrence and survival.

Background: Steadily high melanoma mortality rates urge for the availability of novel biomarkers with a more personalized ability to predict melanoma clinical outcomes. Germline risk variants are promising candidates for this purpose; however, their prognostic potential in melanoma has never been systematically tested.

Methods: We examined the effect of 108 melanoma susceptibility single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), associated in recent GWAS with melanoma and melanoma-related phenotypes, on recurrence-free survival (RFS) and overall survival (OS), in 891 prospectively accrued melanoma patients.

Mitotic rate in melanoma: prognostic value of immunostaining and computer-assisted image analysis.

The prognostic value of mitotic rate in melanoma is increasingly recognized, particularly in thin melanoma in which the presence or absence of a single mitosis/mm can change staging from T1a to T1b. Still, accurate mitotic rate calculation (mitoses/mm) on hematoxylin and eosin (H&E)-stained sections can be challenging. Antimonoclonal mitotic protein-2 (MPM-2) and antiphosphohistone-H3 (PHH3) are 2 antibodies reported to be more mitosis-specific than other markers of proliferation such as Ki-67.

Self-reported cardiac risks and interest in risk modification among volunteer firefighters: a survey-based study.

Context: Coronary heart disease causes approximately 45% of firefighter deaths annually. Although firefighters have clinically significant cardiac risks, a paucity of research and data exists.

Objective: To evaluate firefighters' cardiac risk factors as well as their motivation to resolve these risk factors.

Evaluation of postinjury hepatocyte function by central amino acid clearance.

It has been demonstrated by other investigators that central plasma clearance of amino acids accurately predicts hepatocyte function in patients with liver disease and correlates with clinical outcome. This methodology has not heretofore been studied in the trauma patient. It is our hypothesis that central amino acid clearance in trauma patients is more reflective of hepatocyte function than traditional liver function tests.