Functional and psychosocial impact of COVID-19 pandemic on rheumatic patients’ quality of life in Saudi Arabia

Quality of Life Research - The COVID-19 pandemic might add to the stressors experienced by people living with rheumatic diseases. This study aimed to examine rheumatic patients’ functional...     

CD19 + CD21lo/neg cells are increased in systemic sclerosis-associated interstitial lung disease

Interstitial lung disease (ILD) represents a significant cause of morbidity and mortality in systemic sclerosis (SSc). The purpose of this study was to examine recirculating lymphocytes from SSc patients for potential biomarkers of interstitial lung disease (ILD). Peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were isolated from patients with SSc and healthy controls enrolled in the Vanderbilt University Myositis and Scleroderma Treatment Initiative Center cohort between 9/2017–6/2019. Clinical phenotyping was performed by chart abstraction. Immunophenotyping was performed using both mass cytometry and fluorescence cytometry combined with t-distributed stochastic neighbor embedding analysis and traditional biaxial gating. This study included 34 patients with SSc-ILD, 14 patients without SSc-ILD, and 25 healthy controls. CD21^lo/neg cells are significantly increased in SSc-ILD but not in SSc without ILD (15.4 ± 13.3% vs. 5.8 ± 0.9%, p = 0.002) or healthy controls (5.0 ± 0.5%, p < 0.0001). While CD21^lo/neg B cells can be identified from a single biaxial gate, tSNE analysis reveals that the biaxial gate is comprised of multiple distinct subsets, all of which are increased in SSc-ILD. CD21^lo/neg cells in both healthy controls and SSc-ILD are predominantly tBET positive and do not have intracellular CD21. Immunohistochemistry staining demonstrated that CD21^lo/neg B cells diffusely infiltrate the lung parenchyma of an SSc-ILD patient. Additional work is needed to validate this biomarker in larger cohorts and longitudinal studies and to understand the role of these cells in SSc-ILD.

     

Multiscale quantification of morphological heterogeneity with creation of a predictor of longer survival in glioblastoma

Intratumor heterogeneity is a main cause of the dismal prognosis of glioblastoma (GBM). Yet, there remains a lack of a uniform assessment of the degree of heterogeneity. With a multiscale approach, we addressed the hypothesis that intratumor heterogeneity exists on different levels comprising traditional regional analyses, but also innovative methods including computer-assisted analysis of tumor morphology combined with epigenomic data. With this aim, 157 biopsies of 37 patients with therapy-naive IDH-wildtype GBM were analyzed regarding the intratumor variance of protein expression of glial marker GFAP, microglia marker Iba1 and proliferation marker Mib1. Hematoxylin and eosin stained slides were evaluated for tumor vascularization. For the estimation of pixel intensity and nuclear profiling, automated analysis was used. Additionally, DNA methylation profiling was conducted separately for the single biopsies. Scoring systems were established to integrate several parameters into one score for the four examined modalities of heterogeneity (regional, cellular, pixel-level and epigenomic). As a result, we could show that heterogeneity was detected in all four modalities. Furthermore, for the regional, cellular and epigenomic level, we confirmed the results of earlier studies stating that a higher degree of heterogeneity is associated with poorer overall survival. To integrate all modalities into one score, we designed a predictor of longer survival, which showed a highly significant separation regarding the OS. In conclusion, multiscale intratumor heterogeneity exists in glioblastoma and its degree has an impact on overall survival. In future studies, the implementation of a broadly feasible heterogeneity index should be considered.     

COX20基因变异线粒体复合物Ⅳ缺乏症相关的遗传性周围神经病4例病例系列报告及文献复习

背景：原发性线粒体病具有高度的临床和遗传异质性，其中周围神经是线粒体病的常见受累器官之一。 目的：总结COX20基因变异相关周围神经病的临床表型及遗传学特征。 设计：病例系列报告。 方法：回顾性收集2018年5月至2020年5月复旦大学附属儿科医院诊治的COX20基因变异相关周围神经病患儿的临床资料，总结其临床表现、基因检测结果及治疗效果，并以“COX20”、“线粒体复合物Ⅳ缺乏症（Complex Ⅳ deficiency）”为关键词检索中英文数据库。检索时间均为从建库至2021年12月。总结已报道COX20基因变异与临床表型的关系。 主要结局指标：临床表型和COX20基因变异位点。 结果：4例患儿纳入分析，男、女各2例，其中3例自幼运动发育落后。4例均在儿童期起病，均以行走不稳为首发症状。肌电图均提示多发性周围神经损害改变，感觉神经轴索受累为主。4例患儿均携带COX20基因复合杂合变异，包括错义变异2个，无义变异和移码变异各1个，其中移码变异c.262delG(p.E88Kfs*35)尚未见报道。文献复习目前共报道COX基因变异18个家系22例患儿（包括本文病例）,起病中位年龄为5（1.0~17）岁，22例均以行走困难或步态不稳起病，11例（50.0%）有精神运动发育迟滞，病程中14例(63.6%)出现构音障碍，14例(63.6%)出现肌力下降和/或足部畸形，8例（36.4%）出现共济失调，6例(27.3%)出现肌张力障碍，5例（22.7%）存在认知倒退等。21例患儿行神经传导及肌电图检查，19例(90.5%)提示多发性周围神经病变。头颅（18例）及脊髓（10例）MR检查提示，脊髓萎缩4例（40%），小脑萎缩4例（22.2%）。9例患儿已无法独立行走，丧失独立行走能力中位年龄为10（7~21）岁。目前共报道9个变异位点，4种变异类型，其中错义变异5个，剪切变异2个，无义变异和移码变异各1个。 结论：COX20基因变异患者多早期起病，以周围神经系统病变为主要表现，可合并构音障碍、共济失调、肌张力障碍、认知倒退等，病情逐渐进展，致残率高。COX20基因变异类型以错义变异最常见。