Smoking and combined oral contraceptives should be considered as an independent variable in sex and gender-oriented studies.

The influence of sex combined with smoking and combined oral contraceptives (COC) use on atherogenic indexes is scarcely studied. Thus, traditional lipid parameters were measured, and non-traditional atherogenic indexes were calculated in a young and healthy population of men, COC-free women, and COC users. Total cholesterol (TChol), low-density lipoprotein (LDL), high-density lipoprotein (HDL), and HDL/LDL ratio were lower in men, while triglycerides (TG)/HDL ratio, atherogenic index of plasma (AIP), Castelli's Risk Index I (CRII) and CRI-II, atherogenic coefficient (AC), creatinine, creatinine clearance, and estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) were higher in men.

Psychodiagnostic Investigation between Diabetes and Depression: There Is a Correlation.

In this study, with a psychodiagnostic survey, we wanted to evaluate the possible presence of depressive symptoms in patients diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. The sample of 106 type 2 diabetic patients consisted of three groups. Group A of 80 patients interviewed in 2017 at the Olbia clinic, group A-1 (a subgroup of A), of 41 patients with a follow-up after 5 years from the first examination in 2017 and group B of 26 new type 2 diabetic patients examined for the first time in 2022.

Preventing microalbuminuria with benazepril, valsartan, and benazepril-valsartan combination therapy in diabetic patients with high-normal albuminuria: A prospective, randomized, open-label, blinded endpoint (PROBE) study.

Background: Angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors and angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs) prevent microalbuminuria in normoalbuminuric type 2 diabetic patients. We assessed whether combined therapy with the 2 medications may prevent microalbuminuria better than ACE inhibitor or ARB monotherapy.

Methods And Findings: VARIETY was a prospective, randomized, open-label, blinded endpoint (PROBE) trial evaluating whether, at similar blood pressure (BP) control, combined therapy with benazepril (10 mg/day) and valsartan (160 mg/day) would prevent microalbuminuria more effectively than benazepril (20 mg/day) or valsartan (320 mg/day) monotherapy in 612 type 2 diabetic patients with high-normal albuminuria included between July 2007 and April 2013 by the Istituto di Ricerche Farmacologiche Mario Negri IRCCS and 8 diabetology or nephrology units in Italy.

Is it fair to hope that patients with Type 1 Diabetes (autoimmune) may be spared by the infection of Covid-19?

The CoV-19 infection appears to be unusual among patients with type 1 Diabetes Mellitus, although they are considered a fragile population. We think that this in part due to the peculiar immune condition that leads to the destruction of the Beta cells.

Economic aspects in the management of diabetes in Italy.

Background: Diabetes mellitus (DM) is a chronic-degenerative disease associated with a high risk of chronic complications and comorbidities. The aim of this study is to estimate the average annual cost incurred by the Italian National Health Service (NHS) for the treatment of DM stratified by patients' comorbidities. Moreover, the model estimates the economic impact of implementing good clinical practice for the management of patients with DM.

The Effect of Sex and Gender on Diabetic Complications.

While in non-diabetic people the risk for cardiovascular disease is higher in men, diabetes completely reverts this sex-gender difference conferring to women a greater burden of cardiovascular complications. Additionally, all risk factors associated with cardiovascular disease appear to be more active in diabetic females than in their male counterparts. The reasons of this different impact of diabetes between genders are not completely clear.

Ageing/Menopausal Status in Healthy Women and Ageing in Healthy Men Differently Affect Cardiometabolic Parameters.

Background: Gender medicine requires a global analysis of an individual's life. Menopause and ageing induce variations of some cardiometabolic parameters, but, it is unknown if this occurs in a sex-specific manner. Here, some markers of oxidative stress, systemic inflammation, and endothelial dysfunction are analysed in men younger and older than 45 years and in pre- and postmenopausal women.

Serum metabolomic profiles suggest influence of sex and oral contraceptive use.

Aim: Considering that the effects of sex and oral contraceptives (OCs) on blood metabolites have been scarcely studied and the fact that protocol designs for clinical trials emphasise the use of contraception for women of childbearing potential, we examined if OCs and sex affect the serum levels of the physiologically relevant amino acids, carnitine and acylcarnitines, using metabolomics approaches.

Methods: Healthy adult men and women were enrolled. They were drug free with the exception of women taking cyclic format OCs (ethinylestradiol + different progestins).

Tubulointerstitial disease in diabetic nephropathy.

Diabetes mellitus is the major cause of end stage renal disease (ESRD). We cannot predict which patient will be affected. ESRD patients suffer an extremely high mortality rate, due to a very high incidence of cardiovascular disease.

Regular cigarette smoking influences the transsulfuration pathway, endothelial function, and inflammation biomarkers in a sex-gender specific manner in healthy young humans.

Cigarette smoking (CS) is the primary cause of preventable morbidity and mortality. Abundant clinical evidence suggests that CS is more harmful to women; however, the mechanisms responsible for these differences are not yet known. CS alters endothelial function, the redox state, inflammation, and global DNA methylation, which is associated with one-carbon metabolism and the transsulfuration pathway.

Oral contraceptives modify DNA methylation and monocyte-derived macrophage function.

Background: Fertile women may be encouraged to use contraception during clinical trials to avoid potential drug effects on fetuses. However, hormonal contraception interferes with pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics and modifies internal milieus. Macrophages depend on the milieu to which they are exposed.

Sex-gender differences in diabetes vascular complications and treatment.

Diabetes mellitus and cardiovascular diseases act as two sides of the same coin: diabetes is an important risk factor for cardiovascular disease while patients with ischemic cardiovascular diseases often have diabetes or pre-diabetes. As firstly shown by Framingham study, diabetic women have an increased cardiovascular risk about 3.5 fold higher than non diabetic women, against an increase of "only" 2.

Mendelian breeding units versus standard sampling strategies: Mitochondrial DNA variation in southwest Sardinia.

We report a sampling strategy based on Mendelian Breeding Units (MBUs), representing an interbreeding group of individuals sharing a common gene pool. The identification of MBUs is crucial for case-control experimental design in association studies. The aim of this work was to evaluate the possible existence of bias in terms of genetic variability and haplogroup frequencies in the MBU sample, due to severe sample selection.

Role of oxidized low density lipoproteins and free fatty acids in the pathogenesis of glomerulopathy and tubulointerstitial lesions in type 2 diabetes.

Oxidized lipids initiate and modulate the inflammatory cellular events in the arterial wall and the formation of macrophage foam cells. CD36 mediates the cellular uptake of ox-LDL through its recognition of specific truncated fatty acid moieties and oxidized phosphatidylcholine. Evidence has been reported that chemokine CXCL16, rather than CD36, is the main scavenger receptor in human podocytes mediating the uptake of ox-LDL.

Tissue kallikrein is essential for invasive capacity of circulating proangiogenic cells.

Rationale: Homing of proangiogenic cells (PACs) is guided by chemoattractants and requires proteases to disrupt the extracellular matrix. The possibility that PAC recruitment involves an interaction between proteases and chemotactic factor receptors remains largely unexplored.

Objective: To determine the role of human tissue kallikrein (hK1) in PAC invasion and its dependency on kinin receptor signaling.

Comparative sequence analysis of the non-protein-coding mitochondrial DNA of inbred rat strains.

The proper function of mammalian mitochondria necessitates a coordinated expression of both nuclear and mitochondrial genes, most likely due to the co-evolution of nuclear and mitochondrial genomes. The non-protein coding regions of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) including the D-loop, tRNA and rRNA genes form a major component of this regulated expression unit. Here we present comparative analyses of the non-protein-coding regions from 27 Rattus norvegicus mtDNA sequences.

Importance of glycemic control on the course of glomerular filtration rate in type 2 diabetes with hypertension and microalbuminuria under tight blood pressure control.

Background And Aims: To evaluate the role of glycemic control on the evolution of glomerular filtration rate (GFR) in type 2 diabetes (T2DM) with mild-moderate hypertension under tight blood pressure control, and to address the current controversy whether diabetic nephropathy worsens, independently of blood pressure, proportionally to HbA1c at any physiological level or only when HbA1c is above a 7.5-8% threshold.

Methods And Results: T2DM (N=127) during early stage diabetic nephropathy characterized by microalbuminuria were followed during a 2 year multicenter study.

Linkage Analysis: An Important Tool for Pre-Clinical Alport's Diagnosis.

The phenotypic heterogeneity of Alport's syndrome (AS) is well explained by the genetic heterogeneity. Therefore, the application of genetic techniques, such as linkage analysis (LA), could be helpful in the correct diagnosis of this disease. We performed LA in a family who manifested X-linked inheritance.

Simvastatin maintains steady patterns of GFR and improves AER and expression of slit diaphragm proteins in type II diabetes.

The factors determining the course of glomerular filtration rate (GFR) and albumin excretion rate (AER) and the expression of mRNA of slit diaphragm (SD) and podocyte proteins in microalbuminuric, hypertensive type II diabetic patients are not fully understood. GFR, AER, and SD protein mRNA were studied in 86 microalbuminuric, hypertensive, type II diabetics at baseline and after 4-year random double-blind treatment either with 40 mg simvastatin (Group 1) or with 30 g cholestyramine (Group 2) per day. Both groups had at baseline a GFR decay per year in the previous 2-4 years of 3 ml/min/1.

A longitudinal evaluation of urinary glycosaminoglycan excretion in normoalbuminuric type 1 diabetic patients.

Background: Previously, we found high urinary glycosaminoglycan (GAG) concentration, together with an altered electrophoretic pattern, in normoalbuminuric type 1 diabetic subjects with hemoglobin A(1c) (HbA(1c)) > or =8.0%. The purpose of this study was long-term evaluation of GAG excretion variations in these patients compared to those with HbA(1c) < 8.

Increased renal arterial resistance predicts the course of renal function in type 2 diabetes with microalbuminuria.

Type 2 diabetic patients often die because of end-stage renal failure, but no definitive reliable factor predicting long-term renal outcome has been identified. We tested whether a renal arterial resistance index (R/I) > or =80, using Doppler ultrasound technique, was predictive of worsening renal function. The primary end points of the study were 1) the course of glomerular filtration rate (GFR) and 2) the albumin excretion rate in 157 microalbuminuric, hypertensive, type 2 diabetic patients after a 7.