Holmium laser enucleation of prostate for patients in urinary retention.

Objectives: To evaluate holmium laser enucleation of the prostate in patients presenting in urinary retention secondary to benign prostatic hyperplasia.

Methods: From May 2000 to May 2004, 169 patients, with a mean age of 74 years, who presented in urinary retention secondary to benign prostatic hyperplasia underwent holmium laser enucleation of the prostate. The mean urinary volume drained at catheterization was 670 mL (range 132 to 2000).

Holmium laser enucleation of the prostate: a size-independent new "gold standard".

We report our experience with holmium laser enucleation of the prostate (HoLEP) for treatment of 552 patients with symptomatic benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) and their long-term outcome. Between March 1998 and January 2005, a retrospective review was conducted at our institution of 552 cases in which patients underwent HoLEP. Patient characteristics, indications for surgery, preoperative and postoperative International Prostate Symptom Score (I-PSS), peak flow rate (Qmax), postvoid residual urine, operative data, catheterization time, hospital stay, and immediate and long-term complications were recorded.

Use of prebiotics for inflammatory bowel disease.

The relevance of diet in both the pathogenesis and the therapy of inflammatory bowel disease is an evolving science. Disturbance of intestinal microflora (dysbiosis) is putatively a key element in the environmental component causing inflammatory bowel disease. Prebiotics are among the dietary components used in an attempt to counteract dysbiosis.

Chemoprevention of lung cancer: concepts and strategies.

Lung cancer develops in a stepwise fashion, with an accumulation of molecular alterations progressing through preinvasive steps to invasive disease. This progression could be arrested or reversed through pharmacologic treatments, which are known as cancer chemoprevention. Preclinical and clinical findings relating to different classes of candidate chemopreventive agents provide support for this strategy as an active and promising approach for controlling this disease.

Chemoprevention of lung cancer.

Purpose Of Review: Lung cancer is one of the major causes of cancer-related deaths. Grim mortality figures argue powerfully for new approaches to control this disease. Chemoprevention is the use of specific natural or synthetic chemical agents to reverse, suppress, or prevent carcinogenic progression to invasive cancer.

Redefining lactose as a conditional prebiotic.

Lactose in dairy products is maldigested by up to 70% to 75% of the world's population and many people may therefore suffer symptoms reminiscent of irritable bowel syndrome. As a result, most research to date has concentrated on ways of improving lactose tolerance to enhance dairy as a source of nutrition. However, research on other possible benefits of lactose and its maldigestion has lagged.

Failure to improve parameters of lactose maldigestion using the multiprobiotic product VSL3 in lactose maldigesters: a pilot study.

Lactose maldigestion is a common genetic trait in up to 70% of the world's population. In these subjects, the ingestion of lactose may lead to prebiotic effects which can be confirmed by measurement of breath hydrogen. After a period of continuous lactose ingestion, colonic bacterial adaptation is measurable as improved parameters of lactose digestion.

Progress in lung cancer chemoprevention.

Background: Lung cancer is one of the major causes of cancer-related deaths. Lung cancer mortality figures argue powerfully for new approaches to control this disease. The term chemoprevention can be defined as the use of specific natural or synthetic chemical agents to reverse, suppress, or prevent premalignancy from progressing to invasive cancer.

Nausea, vomiting and diarrhea: an unusual presentation of multiple sclerosis.

The case of a young woman who presented with nausea, vomiting and diarrhea is outlined; the etiology turned out to be a first attack of multiple sclerosis. Plausible mechanisms are discussed.

Diffuse adenomyosis: comparison of endovaginal US and MR imaging with histopathologic correlation.

Purpose: To compare the accuracy of endovaginal ultrasound (US) and magnetic resonance (MR) imaging in the diagnosis of adenomyosis.

Materials And Methods: The authors prospectively studied 119 consecutive patients undergoing hysterectomy. The endovaginal US scans and MR images were interpreted independently in a double-blind fashion.

Dose-response study of dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate on dentate gyrus long-term potentiation.

Neurosteroids are produced peripherally by endocrine glands, as well as enzymatically in the glia from steroid hormone substrates. GABA receptor sites and Ca2+ channel currents are prime targets for neurosteroid actions, and their effects are concentration dependent. For this reason, and the fact that treatment with one of them, sulfated dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEAS), improves performance in tasks involving memory in aged rats, we explored the effect of this hormone on dentate gyrus long term potentiation (LTP) in a dose-response mode.

Experimental model of light focusing of the peripheral cornea.

Purpose: Epidemiologic studies have shown that the onset of cortical cataract occurs primarily in the inferonasal human lens and that the incidence of cortical cataract is correlated with ultraviolet light. Ray tracing analysis has suggested that the peripheral cornea concentrates light on the opposite peripheral lens and that the nose and orbit block peripheral light, except temporally, resulting in a relative concentration of light on the inferonasal lens. Studies were performed to test these theories.

Characterization of focal hepatic lesions with duplex sonography: findings in 198 patients.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to determine the value of duplex Doppler sonography in the characterization of focal hepatic lesions.

Subjects And Methods: Duplex Doppler sonography with a 3-MHz transducer was performed prospectively on 198 patients with focal hepatic lesions. One hundred thirty-two patients had pathologically proved diagnoses, confirming 46 hepatomas and 86 metastatic lesions.

Clinical and histopathological variation in hepatocellular carcinoma.

Objectives: To assess clinical and histopathological variation in hepatocellular carcinoma from different endemic zones and to relate such variation to current putative pathogenic mechanisms of carcinogenesis.

Methods: Review of pertinent English language articles with emphasis on regional differences as they relate to our objectives.

Results: Clinical presentation of hepatocellular carcinoma is variable in different endemic zones.

Laboratory diagnosis and monitoring in chronic systemic autoimmune diseases.

The testing done in the diagnostic immunology laboratory contributes to the management of patients with systemic autoimmune diseases. In these diseases the interaction between environmental factors and a genetically dysregulated immune system produces a continually variable level of disease activity. Improved techniques now allow the clinical scientist to assess the integrity of a patient's immune system and to ascertain qualitative or quantitative disturbances in its activation and expression.

Steroid interactions affecting metabolic activities of a T-lymphocyte line.

A glucocorticoid sensitive T-lymphocyte cell line (CEM) was used to study in vitro interaction effects of steroidal compounds on their metabolic activity. Mixtures of steroidal hormones and related substances were added to the cells and assessed in short-term culture experiments by the incorporation of 3H dTr. Dose ranges were selected to include the linear portion of the dose-response curve of each of the potentially interactive substances.

Unilateral radio-ulnar synostosis, generalized hypotonia, developmental retardation, and a characteristic facial appearance in sibs: a new syndrome.

We report on 2 sibs with generalized hypotonia, developmental retardation, unilateral radio-ulnar synostosis, and a characteristic facial appearance. We propose that they have a new autosomal recessive syndrome.

Immune reactivity in aging-autologous mixed lymphocyte responses.

The level of activity in the autologous mixed lymphocyte reaction (AMLR) was studied in populations of young and old subjects. AMLR activity was reduced in the older age group. A subpopulation of the older age group who had Alzheimer's disease was shown to have the lowest AMLR values.

Costello syndrome.

In 1971, Costello described a new syndrome in 2 patients. The major clinical findings comprise short stature; redundant skin of the neck, palms, soles, and fingers; curly hair; relative macrocephaly; depressed nasal bridge; papillomata around the mouth and nares; distinct facial gestalt; hyperextensible joints; and mental retardation. We present a third patient and review the manifestations of this condition.

Clonal lines of aneuploid cells in Rothmund-Thomson syndrome.

We report on a 21-month-old white boy with the Rothmund-Thomson syndrome. The karyotype on fibroblasts from an area of skin with poikiloderma showed the 46,XY,17 + der(17),t(2;17)(q11;p13) pattern. Karyotype on fibroblasts from normal skin showed two different abnormal patterns: 47,XY, + 8 and 47,XY, + i(2q).

Expression of c-myc protein in skin and synovium in psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis.

Monoclonal antibody against c-myc protein was used in the avidin-biotin-peroxidase complex procedure to examine frozen sections of psoriatic and normal skin and psoriatic synovium for the presence of c-myc protein. A significantly greater percentage (88%) of epithelial cells from psoriatic skin lesions stained for c-myc than uninvolved skin (62%) from both psoriatics and normals (p less than 0.001).

Characterization of a primate model of hypertension. The response of hypertensive and normotensive male vervets (Cercopithecus aethiops) to cold pressor stress, captopril administration, and acute bolus of atrial natriuretic factor.

In feral populations of African green monkeys or vervets (Cercopithecus aethiops), between 5 and 15% of adults have spontaneously elevated blood pressure (BP). We report here the initial biological and pharmacological characterization of this potential animal model of hypertension. Captive male monkeys with elevated systolic pressures show a modest pressure increase in response to stressors such as capture, phlebotomy and cold challenge.