Pulmonary resection for metastases from colorectal cancer

Aim: The prognosis of patients with disseminated colorectal carcinoma is poor except for those with single organ pulmonary or hepatic metastases. The objective of the present study was to evaluate the result of pulmonary metastasectomy for colorectal secondary and to identify the prognostic factors. Methods: This was a retrospective study of 80 patients who had pulmonary metastasectomy for pulmonary secondary from colorectal carcinoma in Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Hong Kong. Results: The overall 5‐year and 10‐year survival rates of the entire cohort were 42.5% and 35.5%, respectively. High premetastasectomy carcinoembryonic antigen (> 20 μg/dL), short disease‐free interval (< 12 months) and incomplete resection were the independent prognostic factors. Neither the characteristics of the primary colorectal tumour nor the number of metastatic nodules had a significant contribution to the long‐term survival. Six patients underwent second pulmonary metastasectomy and three were still free from tumour recurrence after the second operation. Conclusion: Patients with pulmonary metastases from colorectal carcinoma would benefit from pulmonary metastasectomy. High premetastasectomy carcinoembryonic antigen and short disease‐free interval were negative predictive factors for survival. Long‐term follow‐up study is required, as recurrence can occur more than 5 years after pulmonary metastasectomy. Also, whether the survival benefit is due to surgical treatment effect or lead‐time bias remains undecided.     

Correlation of growth factor receptor expression with clinical growth in vestibular schwannomas.

OBJECTIVE: To examine the relationship between growth rate of vestibular schwannomas and the expression of various growth factor receptors. STUDY DESIGN: Retrospective case review of clinical growth rate in conjunction with a histopathologic and immunohistochemical reexamination of archival specimens. SETTING: A tertiary referral neurotologic center. PATIENTS: Three groups: a historical group to act as controls, consisting of 30 patients with sporadic vestibular schwannomas removed before the unit adopted an initial interval scan policy; a group of 14 patients with sporadic vestibular schwannomas who had undergone an initial interval scan policy, showed radiologic evidence of growth, and therefore had their schwannoma removed; and a group of 16 schwannomas removed from 11 neurofibromatosis Type 2 patients. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: A comparison between the three clinical groups using immunohistochemical studies to determine the level of expression of the proliferation factor Ki-67, c-erbB-2, and c-erbB-3 receptors and fibroblastic growth factor receptors 1 and 4. RESULTS: The level of expression of the proliferation factor Ki-67 was very low and similar in all three groups. C-erbB-2 and c-erbB-3 receptors were not expressed in any of the groups. fibroblastic growth factor receptor 4 expression was not significantly different, but there was a variation in the expression of fibroblastic growth factor receptor 1 between the three groups that correlated well with the differing incidence of growth in the groups. The increase in expression of fibroblastic growth factor receptor 1 in the neurofibromatosis Type 2 group was not statistically significant, but the increase in expression of fibroblastic growth factor receptor 1 in the growing sporadic group was statistically significant when compared with the historical controls. The level of fibroblastic growth factor receptor 1 expression correlates significantly with the rate of growth as measured on interval magnetic resonance imaging. CONCLUSIONS: Overexpression of fibroblastic growth factor receptor 1 has a positive correlation with the incidence and the rate of growth of sporadic vestibular schwannomas.     

Use of the SADP for measurement of attitudes of Chinese dental students and dental surgery assistants toward disabled persons

The purpose of this study was to determine the attitudes of Chinese dental students and dental surgery assistants toward disabled persons using the Scale to Determine Attitudes Toward Disabled Persons, the SADP. A group of 99 Hong Kong University psychology students, 50 male and 49 female, was used as the control and to determine the internal consistency and reliability of the Chinese version of the scale. A group of 4th year (n = 25) and a group of 3rd year (n = 46) dental students and a group of in-house dental surgery assistants (n = 86) at the Prince Philip Dental Hospital, Hong Kong, were asked to complete a Chinese translation of the SADP. Results showed that there was no significant difference between attitude scores of 3rd and 4th year dental students (p = 0.06). There was a significant difference in attitude scores between dental students and the dental surgery assistants (p < O.OOl), with those of dental students being lower. In the control group, there was no significant difference between female control and dental surgery assistant scores (p = 0.289). There was a significant difference between dental students and male control scores (p < 10⁶). Not only did the dental students score lower than the dental surgery assistants, but they also scored significantly lower than a group of non-dental students of the same University.     

The Results of Water Fluoridation in Ireland

The visit of Dr. Trendley Dean to Dublin in the mid-1950s helped accelerate the decision to introduce water fluoridation as a public health measure in the prevention of caries in the Republic of Ireland. A challenge to the constitutional validity of the Health (Fluoridation of Water Supplies) Act 1960 failed and in 1964 the water supplies of Dublin city were fluoridated. Over the next seven to eight years all the major urban communities in the Republic of Ireland were fluoridated. Currently, 67 percent of the 3.5 million people in the country reside in fluoridated communities. Studies conducted over the last 20 years show that residents of fluoridated communities have better dental health than those in nonfluoridated communities—the mean dmft is lower in children and the number of natural teeth present in adults is higher.     

Recombinant forms of Gerbich blood group antigens: expression and purification.

Recombinant forms of normal glycophorin C (GPC), carrying the high frequency Gerbich blood group antigens, and its natural deletion mutants of Yus and Ge type (all combined with oligohistidyl tag) were expressed in CHO and COS 7 cells. The stable expression of all recombinant forms of GPC in CHO cells was obtained, but the level of expression was low and detectable only by flow cytometry. The high level of transient expression of GPC recombinant forms in COS 7 cells allowed their purification on Ni-NTA-agarose. The purified recombinant GPC and mutants of Yus and Ge type behaved in SDS-PAGE similarly to normal GPC forms from RBC membranes. The recombinant GPC.Yus and GPC.Ge mutants appeared as diffuse bands, suggesting the similar heterogeneity of glycosylation that was observed in natural GPC.Yus and GPC.Ge glycoproteins. The flow cytometry analysis of the transfected CHO and COS 7 cells showed that binding of anti-GPC monoclonal antibodies to GPC variants was accordant with the known fine specificity of these antibodies. The obtained recombinant forms of GPC carrying common Gerbich antigens may be useful in serology, and also as model molecules for structure-function studies.