Low-sodium diet self-management intervention in heart failure: pilot study results.

Background: Self-care management of a low-sodium diet is a critical component of comprehensive heart failure (HF) treatment.

Aims: The primary purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of an educational intervention on reducing the dietary sodium intake of patients with HF. Secondary purposes were to examine the effects of the intervention on attitudes, subjective norm, and perceived behavioural control towards following a low-sodium diet.

Theory-based low-sodium diet education for heart failure patients.

Theory-based teaching strategies for promoting adherence to a low-sodium diet among patients with heart failure are presented in this article. The strategies, which are based on the theory of planned behavior, address patient attitude, subjective norm, and perceived control as patients learn how to follow a low-sodium diet. Home health clinicians can select a variety of the instructional techniques presented to meet individual patient learning needs.

Inverse correlation between heparan sulfate composition and heparanase-1 gene expression in thyroid papillary carcinomas: a potential role in tumor metastasis.

Purpose: Heparanase-1 (HPR1) is an endoglycosidase that degrades the side chains of heparan sulfate proteoglycan (HSPG), a key component in cell surfaces, the extracellular matrix (ECM), and the basement membrane (BM). The purpose of this study was to evaluate HPR1 expression in thyroid neoplasms and its effect in degrading the HSPG substrates in the ECM and BM and to determine its role in thyroid tumor metastasis.

Experimental Design: HPR1 mRNA expression was analyzed by using in situ hybridization with a digoxigenin-labeled antisense RNA probe on paraffin-embedded tumor sections and reverse transcription-PCR (RT-PCR) in fresh tumor tissues.

Combretastatin A4 phosphate has primary antineoplastic activity against human anaplastic thyroid carcinoma cell lines and xenograft tumors.

Anaplastic thyroid carcinoma (ATC) is a fatal malignancy the clinical outcome of which is unaltered by current therapeutic modalities. A recent phase 1 clinical trial of combretastatin A4 phosphate (CA4P) produced a long-lasting total remission in a patient with ATC. CA4P is a tubulin-binding agent derived from the African bush willow, Combretum caffrum, which possesses tumor vascular-targeting activity.