Urinary hepcidin: an inverse biomarker of acute kidney injury after cardiopulmonary bypass?

Purpose Of Review: In this review, we discuss the potential role of urinary hepcidin, a 2.8-kDa hormonal regulator of iron metabolism, as a biomarker of acute kidney injury (AKI) after cardiopulmonary bypass.

Recent Findings: Hepcidin is one of the novel biomarkers of AKI that have been identified using hypothesis-free, proteomic analysis of urine or plasma in patients who develop AKI.

Somatic mosaicism for chromosome X and Y aneuploidies in monozygotic twins heterozygous for sickle cell disease mutation.

Somatic genetic variation in health and disease is poorly explored. Monozygotic (MZ) twins are a suitable model for studies of somatic mosaicism since genetic differences in twins derived from the same zygote represent an irrefutable example of somatic variation. We report the analysis of a pair of generally healthy female MZ twins, discordant for somatic mosaicism for aneuploidy of chromosomes X and Y.

[Reasons not to have your daughter vaccinated against the human papilloma virus in Twente: a questionnaire study].

Objective: To gain insight into parents' decision-making process, and their reasons for participation in the human papilloma virus (HPV) vaccination programme in the Twente region, the Netherlands.

Design: Cross-sectional study by means of a questionnaire.

Methods: After the first vaccination round, a questionnaire was sent to the parents of 800 13-year-old girls, born in the year 1996 and living in the Twente region.

Testosterone suppresses hepcidin in men: a potential mechanism for testosterone-induced erythrocytosis.

Context: The mechanisms by which testosterone increases hemoglobin and hematocrit are unknown.

Objective: The aim was to test the hypothesis that testosterone-induced increase in hematocrit is associated with suppression of the iron regulatory peptide hepcidin.

Participants: Healthy younger men (ages 19-35 yr; n = 53) and older men (ages 59-75 yr; n = 56) were studied.

Orange but not apple juice enhances ferrous fumarate absorption in small children.

Objective: Ferrous fumarate is a common, inexpensive iron form increasingly used instead of ferrous sulfate as a food iron supplement. However, few data exist as to whether juices enhance iron absorption from ferrous fumarate.

Subjects And Methods: We studied 21 children, ages 4.

Informing family members about a hereditary predisposition to cancer: attitudes and practices among clinical geneticists.

If a hereditary predisposition to colorectal cancer or breast cancer is diagnosed, most guidelines state that clinical geneticists should request index patients to inform their at-risk relatives about the existence of this condition in their family, thus enabling them to consider presymptomatic genetic testing. Those identified as mutation carriers can undertake strategies to reduce their risk of developing the disease or to facilitate early diagnosis. This procedure of informing relatives through the index patient has been criticised, as it results in relatively few requests for genetic testing, conceivably because a certain number of relatives remain uninformed.

Survey into bereavement of family members of patients who died in the intensive care unit.

Background: The death of a family member in the intensive care unit (ICU) is often sudden and unexpected and may have a strong impact on family members.

Objective: To describe the characteristics of bereavement, to find out if there is a need for follow-up bereavement service and to determine if the information and care in the ICU is sufficient for relatives of deceased ICU patients.

Methods: An exploratory cross-sectional study using a structured telephone interview in 51 relatives, in a 10 bed adult mixed medical-surgical ICU.

Cytogenetics meets phylogenetics: a review of karyotype evolution in diprotodontian marsupials.

We have used a combined approach of phylogenetics and cytogenetics to describe karyotype evolution in Diprotodontia. Molecular relationships of diprotodontian marsupials have been clarified using a concatenation of 5 nuclear gene sequences from multiple exemplars of all extant genera. Our well-resolved phylogenetic tree has been used as a basis for understanding chromosome evolution both within this Order, as well as in marsupials in general.

Intestinal ferroportin expression in pediatric Crohn's disease.

Background: Anemia is a frequent complication of Crohn's disease (CD). The intestinal iron exporter ferroportin (FPN) is involved in both iron deficiency anemia and the anemia of chronic disease. To examine its role in CD, intestinal FPN expression was studied in subjects with and without CD.

Maternal serum hepcidin is low at term and independent of cord blood iron status.

Objectives: Hepcidin is the key regulator of iron homeostasis. The aims of this study were to determine serum hepcidin concentrations and reference ranges in pregnant women and cord blood of newborns at term and to evaluate the associations between hepcidin concentrations and iron status parameters.

Methods: A total of 191 pregnant women-newborn pairs were studied in Kuopio University Hospital, Finland.

Reduction of serum hepcidin by hemodialysis in pediatric and adult patients.

Background And Objectives: Hepcidin, the principal regulator of iron homeostasis, may play a critical role in the response of patients with anemia to iron and erythropoiesis-stimulating agent therapy; however, the contribution of hepcidin to iron maldistribution and anemia in hemodialysis (HD) patients and the ability of HD to lower serum hepcidin levels have not been fully characterized.

Design, Setting, Participants, & Measurements: We measured serum hepcidin using a competitive ELISA in 30 pediatric and 33 adult HD patients. In addition, we determined serum hepcidin kinetics and calculated hepcidin clearance by measuring serum hepcidin before, during, and after HD in eight pediatric and six adult patients.

Diagnostic accuracy of serum hepcidin for iron deficiency in critically ill patients with anemia.

Purpose: Inflammation-induced anemia is frequent among critically ill patients and can be aggravated by true iron deficiency (ID) resulting from blood losses. The serum hepcidin level controls the availability of iron for erythropoiesis, and its determination offers new perspectives for the diagnosis of ID in the presence of inflammation. We conducted a prospective observational study to determine the cutoff value and diagnostic accuracy of hepcidin levels for detecting ID in critically ill anemic patients.

Hepcidin--a potential novel biomarker for iron status in chronic kidney disease.

Background And Objectives: Hepcidin is a key regulator of iron homeostasis, but its study in the setting of chronic kidney disease (CKD) has been hampered by the lack of validated serum assays.

Design, Setting, Participants, & Measurements: This study reports the first measurements of bioactive serum hepcidin using a novel competitive ELISA in 48 pediatric (PCKD2-4) and 32 adult (ACKD2-4) patients with stages 2 to 4 CKD along with 26 pediatric patients with stage 5 CKD (PCKD5D) on peritoneal dialysis.

Results: When compared with their respective controls (pediatric median = 25.

Iron absorption in dysmetabolic iron overload syndrome is decreased and correlates with increased plasma hepcidin.

Background/aims: The dysmetabolic iron overload syndrome (DIOS) is a common disorder but its origin remains unclear.

Methods: A case-control study was conducted to compare intestinal absorption of iron in 16 men with DIOS (age 53 +/- 11 years, serum ferritin 750 +/- 372 microg/l, hepatic iron 78 +/- 25 micromol/g) and in 32 age-matched controls with normal body iron stores (16 overweight subjects and 16 lean subjects). Intestinal absorption was calculated as the area under the curve (AUC) of 58Fe administered orally and correlated with plasma hepcidin and with insulin resistance parameters including HOMA.

Daily regulation of serum and urinary hepcidin is not influenced by submaximal cycling exercise in humans with normal iron metabolism.

Hepcidin and hemojuvelin (HJV) are two critical regulators of iron metabolism as indicated by the development of major iron overload associated to mutations in hepcidin and HJV genes. Hepcidin and HJV are highly expressed in liver and muscles, respectively. Intensive muscular exercise has been reported to modify serum iron parameters and to increase hepcidinuria.

A Population-based study of Toenail onychomycosis in Israeli children.

Onychomycosis is widespread in the adult population, but considered to be rare in children. A number of studies in recent years show a rise in the prevalence of toenail onychomycosis in children. Of these, only a few were population-based.

A phylogeny of Diprotodontia (Marsupialia) based on sequences for five nuclear genes.

Even though the marsupial order Diprotodontia is one of the most heavily studied groups of Australasian marsupials, phylogenetic relationships within this group remain contentious. The more than 125 living species of Diprotodontia can be divided into two main groups: Vombatiformes (wombats and koalas) and Phalangerida. Phalangerida is composed of the kangaroos (Macropodidae, Potoroidae, and Hypsiprymnodontidae) and possums (Phalangeridae, Burramyidae, Petauridae, Pseudocheiridae, Tarsipedidae, and Acrobatidae).

Serum hepcidin is significantly associated with iron absorption from food and supplemental sources in healthy young women.

Background: Hepcidin is a key regulator of iron homeostasis, but to date no studies have examined the effect of hepcidin on iron absorption in humans.

Objective: Our objective was to assess relations between both serum hepcidin and serum prohepcidin with nonheme-iron absorption in the presence and absence of food with the use of dual stable-iron-isotope techniques.

Design: The study group included 18 healthy nonpregnant women.

Immunoassay for human serum hepcidin.

We developed and validated the first serum enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay for hepcidin, the principal iron-regulatory hormone that has been very difficult to measure. In healthy volunteers, the 5% to 95% range of hepcidin concentrations was 29 to 254 ng/mL in men (n = 65) and 17 to 286 ng/mL in women (n = 49), with median concentrations 112 versus 65 (P < .001).

A mutation in the TMPRSS6 gene, encoding a transmembrane serine protease that suppresses hepcidin production, in familial iron deficiency anemia refractory to oral iron.

Background: Hepcidin plays a key role in body iron metabolism by preventing the release of iron from macrophages and intestinal cells. Defective hepcidin synthesis causes iron loading, while overproduction results in defective reticuloendothelial iron release and iron absorption.

Design And Methods: We studied a Sardinian family in which microcytic anemia due to defective iron absorption and utilization is inherited as a recessive character.

Two nonsense mutations in the TMPRSS6 gene in a patient with microcytic anemia and iron deficiency.

Genetic causes of hypochromic microcytic anemia include thalassemias and some rare inherited diseases such as DMT1 deficiency. Here, we show that iron deficiency anemia with poor intestinal absorption and defective iron utilization of IV iron is caused by inherited mutations in TMPRSS6, a liver-expressed gene that encodes a membrane-bound serine protease of previously unknown role that was recently reported to be a regulator of hepcidin expression.

Biochemical, molecular, and virulence characteristics of select Mycobacterium marinum isolates in hybrid striped bass Morone chrysops x M. saxatilis and zebrafish Danio rerio.

A panel of 15 Mycobacterium marinum isolates was characterized by biochemical tests, sequencing the ribosomal DNA intergenic spacer (ITS) region and the heat shock protein 65 gene (hsp65) and pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE). The biochemical characteristics of all isolates were similar, except for Tween 80 hydrolysis. DNA sequence of hsp65 for a subset of isolates were identical; however, at position 5 of the ITS rDNA, a single nucleotide polymorphism was identified.

What makes men and women with musculoskeletal complaints decide they are too sick to work?

Objective: The objective of this study was to determine what makes men and women with musculoskeletal complaints decide to call in sick for work.

Methods: Qualitative, face-to-face interviews were used with employees (16 men and 14 women) who had called in sick due to a musculoskeletal complaint and who expected to be absent from work for at least 2 weeks on sick leave.

Results: The participants fell into the following two main groups: those who were off sick because of a diagnosed medical condition, such as a fracture, and those who were off sick because of an unidentifiable complaint, such as low-back pain.