Feasibility of the novel 'Tobacco-Free Hospital' model and its compliance assessment at a tertiary care hospital of New Delhi, India.

Background: Tobacco is one of the biggest threats to the public health. Tobacco harms not only human health but also the environment. The Cigarette and Other Tobacco Products Act (COTPA) was implemented in India in 2003.

Comparison of safety and efficacy of convalescent plasma with fresh frozen plasma in severe covid-19 patients.

Background: Role of Convalescent plasma (COPLA) to treat severe COVID-19 is under investigation. We compared efficacy and safety of COPLA with fresh frozen plasma (FFP) in severe COVID-19 patients.

Methods: One group received COPLA with standard medical care (n = 14), and another group received random donor FFP, as control with standard medical care (n = 15) in severe COVID-19 disease.

Prevalence, patterns and sociocultural factors associated with use of tobacco-based dentifrices () in India.

Background: India poses a novel tobacco problem with majority of the tobacco users consuming smokeless form of tobacco (21.4%). Gul is one such Smokeless Tobacco (ST) product that is manufactured commercially as a dentifrice to be applied to the teeth and then to gums many times during the day, making it a cheap and easy tobacco source.

Literature review of oral tuberculosis and report of a case with unique histological presentation.

As a consequence of the emergence of drug resistant tuberculosis (TB) and various immuno-compromised states, there is a re-emergence of many forgotten extrapulmonary manifestations of TB including oral TB, which must be taken into consideration while diagnosing oral lesions. The present article discusses the geographical burden, temporal evolution, demographic variables, clinical presentation and treatment of oral TB. The occurrence is most commonly secondary to pulmonary TB but oral symptoms may precede systemic symptoms.

Assessment of possible tuberculous lymphadenopathy by PCR compared to non-molecular methods.

Tuberculosis is a major public health problem in India and other developing countries and has formed a lethal partnership with AIDS. It often presents a diagnostic challenge especially when clinical presentation is suggestive but bacteriological proof is lacking. The objective of this study was to compare the various diagnostic techniques in clinically suspected cases of tubercular lymph nodes and to find a suitable, cost-effective but sensitive and specific method for diagnosis.

p53 gene mutation and human papillomavirus (HPV) infection in esophageal carcinoma from three different endemic geographic regions of India.

Infection of high-risk human papillomaviruses (HPVs), particularly the HPV types 16 and 18 and mutation or aberrant expression of the p53 tumour suppressor gene, has strongly been implicated in human esophageal carcinoma, which shows a great variation in geographic distribution. Neither the reason(s) for such a variation nor the etiopathogenesis of the disease is clearly understood. The present study has been carried out to determine prevalence of high-risk HPV types 16 and 18 and the p53 gene mutation in patients from three distinctly different endemic geographic regions of India, viz.

Eliminating the diagnosis atypical squamous cells of undetermined significance: impact on the accuracy of the Papanicolaou test.

Objective: To assess eliminating the diagnosis "atypical squamous cells of undetermined significance" (ASCUS) from the Bethesda System for Reporting Cervical/Vaginal Cytological Diagnoses and analyze its impact on the sensitivity and positive predictive value of Pap smears.

Study Design: A total of 166 previously diagnosed ASCUS cases with follow-up biopsy results available were prospectively downgraded to within normal limits/benign cellular changes or upgraded to specific squamous intraepithelial lesions (SILs) or the malignant category. These review cytodiagnoses were compared with the histologic outcome.

Novel germline mutations in breast cancer susceptibility genes BRCA1, BRCA2 and p53 gene in breast cancer patients from India.

Mutations in breast cancer susceptibility genes, BRCA1 and BRCA2 account for more than 80% of hereditary breast and ovarian cancers. p53 tumor suppressor gene that controls cellular growth and differentiation is also known to be mutated in more than 50% of human cancers including breast cancer. We have carried out a study on BRCA1 and BRCA2 along with p53 gene mutations in both sporadic as well as familial breast cancer patients from India where breast cancer is fast emerging as a major cancer among premenopausal urban women.

Constitutive activation of transcription factor AP-1 in cervical cancer and suppression of human papillomavirus (HPV) transcription and AP-1 activity in HeLa cells by curcumin.

The transcription factor AP-1 plays a central role in the transcriptional regulation of specific types of high-risk human papillomaviruses (HPVs) such as HPV16 and HPV18, which are etiologically associated with the development of cancer of the uterine cervix in women. In our study, we investigated the AP-1 binding activity and the expression pattern of different members of the AP-1 transcription factor family (c-Jun, JunB, JunD, c-Fos, FosB, Fra-1 and Fra-2) in different grades of cervical lesions starting from mild dysplasia to invasive cervical tumors, including normal control tissues, using specific antibodies raised against each of the AP-1 members. Results indicate that though AP-1 showed high binding activity and the majority of its members were highly expressed in tumor tissues, there is a distinct pattern of gradual increase of c-fos and a concomitant decrease of fra-1 expression that perfectly match the progression of cervical lesions.

Rapid rescreening of cervical smears by cytopathologists: experience at a WHO collaborating centre for research in cytology.

The conventional 10% random full rescreening of cervical smears has been criticized as a quality assurance measure as it is not scientifically based and tends to detect only a few false negative cases. Rapid rescreening (RR) of negative cervical smears seems to be a viable alternative, especially in developing countries, as it picks up more positive lesions, reduces the false negative rate and is cost effective. We performed rapid review on 12374 cervical smears received under a hospital based cervical cancer screening programme.

Overexpression of c-erbB-2 oncoprotein and associated pathobiological factors in invasive primary breast cancer.

Breast cancer tissues from 271 cases were analyzed immunologically for c-erbB-2 oncoprotein (HER-2/neu), epidermal growth factor receptor (EGF-R) and estrogen receptor (ER). Overexpression of both c-erbB-2 oncoprotein and EGF-R showed an inverse association with ER and a direct association with metastatic involvement of lymph node and high histological grade. The frequency of c-erbB-2 and EGF-R overexpression was significantly higher among postmenopausal cases in comparison with premenopausal cases.

Restriction fragment length polymorphism of L1 amplicon using Rsa 1 detects five different human papillomavirus types and their co-infections among women attending a gynaecological outpatient department.

Detection of human papillomavirus (HPV) types 6, 11, 16, 18, and 33 including co-infections among females attending gynaecological outpatient department and cancer clinics, was done by restriction fragment length polymorphism (using Rsa-1), of approximately 450bp amplicon, obtained by the amplification of the L1 region of HPV genome with consensus primers MY09/11 [Cancer Cells 7 (1989) 209]. The results were further tested with HPV type specific primers [J. Med.

Atypical squamous cells of undetermined significance: is it worthwhile to qualify them further?

Background: In Bethesda System of reporting cervico-vaginal smears, the equivocal epithelial cell abnormalities have been categorised as "atypical squamous and glandular cells of undetermined significance" (ASCUS and AGUS). These abnormalities may harbour minor lesions attributed to mere inflammatory changes to potentially serious high grade lesions. It is recommended to further qualify these lesions according to whether they favor a reactive or a neoplastic outcome.

Polymorphism of the p53 codon 72 Arg/Pro and the risk of HPV type 16/18-associated cervical and oral cancer in India.

Infection of high risk human papillomaviruses (HPVs) specifically the types 16 and 18 has been strongly implicated in the development of cervical cancer. The E6 oncoproteins of these high risk HPVs are known to bind and induce degradation of p53 tumour suppressor protein through the ubiquitin pathways. This degradation is controlled by a common polymorphism of the p53 gene encoding either a proline or an arginine at its codon 72 in exon 4.

Acantholytic cells exfoliated from pemphigus vulgaris of the uterine cervix. A case report.

Background: Pemphigus vulgaris of the uterine cervix is rare and almost always associated with cutaneous or mucosal lesions elsewhere on the body. Without a history of pemphigus, acantholytic cells in cervical smears may be misdiagnosed as malignant ones.

Case: A 52-year-old female presented with a vaginal discharge, and a routine cervical smear was collected for cytology.

Distribution of prognostically unfavourable product of c-erbB-2 oncogene and EGF-R in carcinomas of the breast and uterine cervix.

A comparative study was undertaken between cancer of the uterine cervix (n = 50) and female breast cancer (n = 50) with reference to the expression of c-erbB-2 oncoprotein (HER-2/neu) and that of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGF-R), both being highly homologous structurally. Expressions of EGF-R and c-erbB-2 oncoprotein were viewed in breast and cervical cancer tissues by immunochemical staining. Cervical cancer cases showed much higher expression of EGF-R which also revealed significant association with the expression of c-erbB-2 oncoprotein and tumour grading.

A simple 'paper smear' method for dry collection, transport and storage of cervical cytological specimens for rapid screening of HPV infection by PCR.

Human papillomaviruses (HPVs) are major pathogens associated with the development of cancer of the uterine cervix, the most common malignant tumour of women worldwide. Reliable diagnosis of HPV infection, particularly the 'high-risk' types (16/18), may facilitate early identification of 'high-risk' populations for developing cervical cancer and may augment the sensitivity and specificity of primary cervical cancer screening programmes by complementing the conventional Pap test. A simple paper smear method has been developed for dry collection, transport and storage of cervical smears/scrapes at room temperature for subsequent detection of HPV DNA by PCR assay.

Amoebiasis: diagnosis by aspiration and exfoliative cytology.

The present study was undertaken to evaluate the use of fine needle aspiration and exfoliative cytology in the identification of amoebic cysts/trophozoites, and to characterize amoebiasis. The subjects consisted of 15 patients, 11 diagnosed by fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) as amoebic abscesses (14 liver and one pulmonary) and four women whose cervical smears contained Entamoeba histolytica cysts or trophozoites. Of 128 ultrasonographically guided FNAC of hepatic lesions over a four year period, 17 were abscesses of which 10 were diagnosed as amoebic.

DNA aneuploidy in invasive carcinoma of the uterine cervix.

Forty cases of squamous cell carcinoma and twenty cases of adenocarcinoma of the cervix were subjected to DNA ploidy analysis to find out the frequency of aneuploid DNA pattern in different types of invasive carcinoma of the uterine cervix and their possible correlation with the clinical stage and age of the patients. From the DNA analysis an increasing trend of DNA aneuploidy was observed from well differentiated (63.6%) to moderately differentiated (70.

Adrenocorticotropic hormone and growth factor receptors in breast cancer.

Tissues from 100 cases of breast cancer were analysed immunohistochemically for the presence of adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) or ACTH-like peptides and expression of c-erbB-2 oncoprotein, epidermal growth factor receptor (EGF-R) as well as oestrogen receptor (ER). Immunopositivity for ACTH was found in 15% cases of infiltrating duct carcinoma of the breast, whereas 38% and 36% breast tumours were positive for c-erbB-2 and EGF-R respectively. While 27% cases were positive for ER.

Screening for cancer of uterine cervix and approaches adopted in India.

Cervical cancer is the leading malignancy among Indian women. It has been estimated that in the absence of any control programme, the incident number of cervical cancer cases in the country would rise to 140 thousand by the turn of this century. Cytology screening remains the main stay for the control of cervix cancer.

Breast and prostate cancer.

There are interesting similarities between carcinomas of the breast and prostate. Both genetic and exogenous factors are probably important in the development of breast and prostate cancers. Since there is an alarming increasing trend in the incidence of both cancers worldwide including India, high level of apprehension/awareness has been created among the general educated population.