Carvedilol Inhibits Matrix Metalloproteinase-2 Activation in Experimental Autoimmune Myocarditis: Possibilities of Cardioprotective Application.

Aims: Acute myocarditis is a potentially lethal inflammatory heart disease that frequently precedes the development of dilated cardiomyopathy and subsequent heart failure. At present, there is no effective standardized therapy for acute myocarditis, besides the optimal care of heart failure and arrhythmias in accordance with evidence-based guidelines and specific etiology-driven therapy for infectious myocarditis. Carvedilol has been shown to be cardioprotective by reducing cardiac pro-inflammatory cytokines present in oxidative stress in certain heart diseases.

Diagnostic usefulness of sCD163, procalcitonin and neopterin for sepsis risk assessment in critically ill patients.

Background: Sepsis is one of the most common causes of hospitalization and it is characterized by a high mortality rate in spite of the great progress in diagnosis and treatment achieved in recent years. Early diagnosis of sepsis is one of the most important elements of effective treatment. The clinical symptoms are not specific and biomarkers are considered to be useful tools in sepsis diagnostics.

Malignant hyperthermia susceptibility in patients with exertional rhabdomyolysis: a retrospective cohort study and updated systematic review.

Introduction: Two potentially fatal syndromes, malignant hyperthermia (MH), an adverse reaction to general anesthesia, and exertional rhabdomyolysis (ER) share some clinical features, including hyperthermia, muscle rigidity, tachycardia, and elevated serum creatine kinase. Some patients with ER have experienced an MH event and/or have been diagnosed as MH susceptible (MHS). In order to assess the relationship between ER and MH further, we conducted a retrospective cohort study summarizing clinical and genetic information on Canadian patients with ER who were diagnosed as MHS.

An efficient method for isolation of representative and contamination-free population of blood platelets for proteomic studies.

To date, there has been no ideal method for blood platelet isolation which allows one to obtain a preparation devoid of contaminations, reflecting the activation status and morphological features of circulating platelets. To address these requirements, we have developed a method which combines the continuous density gradient centrifugation with washing from PGI-supplemented platelet-rich plasma (PRP). We have assessed the degree of erythrocyte and leukocyte contamination, recovery of platelets, morphological features, activation status, and reactivity of isolated platelets.

[Diagnostic utility of RHD-gene detection in maternal plasma in the prophylaxis of feto-maternal Rh-incompatibility].

Objectives: The aim of the study was analytical validation of prenatal noninvasive fetal RHD detection in maternal plasma and the preliminary assessment of its clinical utility Introduction of this noninvasive test into routine diagnostic use is important for more rational and safe immunoprophylaxis.

Material And Methods: RHD gene was detected using real-time PCR. Primers and probes complementary to sequence on exons 7 and 10 were chosen.

Ligand binding pocket function of Drosophila USP is necessary for metamorphosis.

The widely accepted paradigm that epoxidized methyl farnesoates ("juvenile hormones," JHs) are the principal sesquiterpenoid hormones regulating insect metamorphosis was assessed in Drosophila melanogaster. GC-MS analysis of circulating methyl farnesoids during the mid to late 3rd instar showed that methyl farnesoate is predominant over methyl epoxyfarnesoate (=JH III). The circulating concentration of methyl farnesoate (reaching nearly 500 nM), was easily high enough on a kinetic basis to load the Drosophila ortholog of the nuclear hormone receptor RXR (also known as "ultraspiracle," USP), whereas the circulating concentrations of JH III and methyl bisepoxyfarnesoate (bisepoxyJH III) were not.

The retinoid-X receptor ortholog, ultraspiracle, binds with nanomolar affinity to an endogenous morphogenetic ligand.

The in vivo ligand-binding function and ligand-binding activity of the Drosophila melanogaster retinoid-X receptor (RXR) ortholog, ultraspiracle, toward natural farnesoid products of the ring gland were assessed. Using an equilibrium fluorescence-binding assay, farnesoid products in the juvenile hormone (JH) biosynthesis pathway, and their epoxy derivatives, were measured for their affinity constant for ultraspiracle (USP). Farnesol, farnesal, farnesoic acid and juvenile hormone III exhibited high nanomolar to low micromolar affinity, which in each case decreased upon addition of an epoxide across a double bond of the basic farnesyl structure.

[Experience gained by the use of mineral water at a health resort on early rehabiliation of patients operated on for cholelithiasis].

Our studies suggest to us expediency of assigning those patients having been operated on for cholelithiasis running an uncomplicated course for rehabilitative treatment in a sanatorium-health resort setting with Mirgorodskaya type low mineralized weak-alkaline sodium-chloride water.

[Experience with the early health resort rehabilitation of patients who have undergone a surgical intervention for peptic ulcer].

The present article focuses on the analysis of results of health-resort rehabilitative treatment of 49 patients operated on for gastric and duodenal ulcer, in the early postoperative period (by day 20). The treatments were administered at the health-promotion centre Iuzhnyĭ [correction of "Yuzhny"] (Mirgorod), the Mirgorod mineral water having been taken as a basis of said treatment. A conclusion was reached to the effect that the optimum term for entering the patients into the rehabilitative project and ensuring their complication-free status is day 20 after the operation.

[The early rehabilitation of patients, operated on for peptic ulcer and cholelithiasis, at Mirgorod health resort].

The authors analyzed the condition of 51 patients in the early period of operation for ulcer and cholelithiasis. It was found that most patients showed asthenic, dyspeptic and pam syndromes, anemia, hypoacidic or achylous gastritis, inflammation at the operative site. As a result of treatment at the Mirgorod health resort (physiotherapy, mineral water) there occurred a significant improvement in the patients' condition.