Giant Osteoma of Mandible Causing Dyspnea: A Rare Case Presentation and Review of the Literature

Osteomas are benign slow growing tumors of bone. Tumors are usually asymptomatic until they attain remarkable size and cause asymmetry or dysfunction. In view of few reported cases of giant osteoma of mandible, this article presents a case of giant osteoma of left mandible in a 53-year old male causing dyspnea due to compression of air way space.     

Hereditary neuropathy with liability to pressure palsies

Journal of Neurology - Hereditary neuropathy with liability to pressure palsies (HNPP) is characterized by recurrent sensory and motor neuropathy in individual nerves starting in adolescence or...     

Comparison of Short-Term Effectiveness and Postoperative Complications: Laparoscopic Gastric Plication vs Laparoscopic Sleeve Gastrectomy

Introduction

Bariatric surgeries are the only effective long-term treatment in obese patients. The innovation of laparoscopic gastric plication (LGP) raised some questions about its effectiveness compared to traditionally used techniques such as laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy (LSG). We tried to answer some of these questions.

Materials and Methods

We investigated 70 patients in a randomized clinical trial (IRCT2013123012294N5) from 2012 to 2015. Thirty-five patients were randomly assigned to each LSG or LGP group, using sealed envelope method. The body mass index (BMI) reduction and the percentage of excess weight loss (%EWL) along with %total body weight loss (%TWL) were primary endpoint and were assessed at follow-up periods. We recorded postoperative complications, as well.

Results

Two-year follow-up rate was 100%. There were no statistically significant differences between the two groups in means of preoperative BMI. Also, postoperative follow-ups were not suggestive for a significant difference in BMI (all p values > 0.05). The mean %EWL at follow-ups showed no significant difference at any point, except for 3 and 6 months after surgery (p value = 0.002 and 0.017, respectively). This finding was confirmed by %TWL trend in 12 months after surgery. LSG patients were readmitted more than LGP patients (seven cases vs one case, p value = 0.024). Postoperative complications such as nausea and vomiting, hair loss, iron deficiency, vitamin D deficiency, and cholelithiasis were not different between the two groups. There was one death in the LGP group due to pulmonary thromboembolism.

Conclusions

LGP showed to be efficient regarding %EWL and %TWL reduction in short-term follow-ups with comparable postoperative complications to LSG.

     

Evaluation of Apoptotic and Antileishmanial Activities of Artemisinin on Promastigotes and BALB/C Mice Infected with Leishmania major

Background:

In leishmaniasis, some drugs prescribed for treatment have toxic effects and there are reports about drug resistance in some countries. Due to this fact, using herbal drugs such as artemisinin with good efficacy and low toxic effect might be suitable.

Methods:

We evaluated the apoptotic effect of artemisinin on Leishmania major in vitro and the antileishmanial activities of artemisinin on leishmaniasis in BALB/c mice and at the end INF-γ and IL-4 cytokines levels were detected by ELISA in spleen cell culture supernatants. During treatment the lesion size and survival rate were measured each four and ten days, respectively.

Results:

Percentage of early and late apoptosis in promastigotes of control group and promastigotes treated with 10, 25, 50 and 100 μg/ml of artemisinin after 48 h were 0.13, 16.04, 41.23, 49.03 and 81.83, respectively. The IFN-γ in ointment treated group were higher than those of other groups (P<0.05). The in vivo results showed that ointment compounds healed the lesions more effectively rather than intraperitoneal injection method (P<0.05). The survival rate of mice 150 days after challenge in treated group with ointment of artemisinin was 66% while all mice in control groups were died.

Conclusion:

All of in vitro results represented that this drug had antileishmanial effects and these results were confirmed by evaluation effects in vivo condition of leishmaniasis. Interestingly, according to these results it can be concluded that this drug has antileishmanial effects in vitro and in vivo conditions. Artemisinin induces cytotoxic effect on L. major via apoptosis-related mechanism.