Distribution of basal ganglia lesions in Pick's disease with Pick bodies: A topographic neuropathological study of eight autopsy cases

The distribution of the basal ganglia lesions, including the amygdala, striatum, and pallidum, were investigated neuropathologically in eight Japanese autopsy cases of Pick's disease with Pick bodies. The lesions were classified as mild, moderate or severe. The degree and distribution of basal ganglia lesions in all eight cases were uniform: the amygdala showed severe to moderate lesions, the caudate nucleus and putamen showed moderate to mild lesions, and the pallidum showed mild lesions. Furthermore, the lesions in the amygdala were more prominent in the basolateral group than in the corticomedial group. In Pick's disease with Pick bodies, the degree and distribution of the lesions within the basal ganglia differs from those reported in both ‘Pick's disease without Pick bodies’ and corticobasal degeneration (CBD), in which severe lesions were present in the pallidum. These neuropathological findings may contribute to the morphological differential diagnosis among Pick's disease with Pick bodies, ‘Pick's disease without Pick bodies’, and CBD.     

Review of primary unknown cancer: cases referred to the National Cancer Center Hospital East

Background  

Primary unknown cancer (PUC) is not rare neoplasm. The clinical features and survival time of these patients are heterogeneous. We analyzed cases that were referred to the National Cancer Center Hospital East with preliminary diagnosed PUC to evaluate the natural history and clinical features.     

Biofilm formation on rat skin wounds by Pseudomonas aeruginosa carrying the green fluorescent protein gene

Please cite this paper as: Biofilm formation on rat skin wounds by Pseudomonas aeruginosa carrying the green fluorescent protein gene. Experimental Dermatology 2010; 19:154–156. Abstract: Most chronic wounds are covered by biofilms. However, questions remain about whether biofilms are a causative factor in delayed wound healing and whether the biofilm state contributes to this pathology. The purpose of this study was to develop an experimental model for convenient observation of biofilm formation on skin wounds. Full‐thickness wounds were created on the backs of SD rats. Suspensions of Pseudomonas aeruginosa carrying the gene encoding green fluorescent protein were then applied to the wounds. The wounds were harvested at 8 h, and at 1, 3 and 7 days postwounding for histological and immunohistochemical examinations. Fluorescence microscopy confirmed the presence of a biofilm as early as 8 h. Comparing with non‐infected wounds, epithelialization was not delayed. In conclusion, wound healing of rat acute wounds was unaffected by biofilm formation.     

Cardiac surgery in a patient with multiple myeloma combined with renal amyloidosis

We present a case of a 62-year-old woman who underwent mitral valve and aortic valve replacement owing to infective endocarditis. Previously, the patient had been diagnosed with renal amyloidosis and multiple myeloma. She underwent chemotherapy and autologous peripheral blood stem cell transplantation and has achieved nearly complete remission. The patient’s postoperative course was almost uneventful, and she was discharged on the 22nd postoperative day. This is the first case report about cardiac surgery for the patient with multiple myeloma combined with renal amyloidosis.     

Factor structures of a Japanese version of the Geriatric Depression Scale and its correlation with the quality of life and functional ability

We investigated the 15-item Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS-15) with regard to its factors and, reproducibility, as well as its relationship to activities of daily living, social factors, medical conditions, and quality of life for community-dwelling elderly people in Japan. The study population consisted of 736 community-dwelling elderly participants aged 65 or older. Exploratory factor analysis of the data and correlation coefficients between factors and activities of daily living, quality of life, social factors, and medical conditions were calculated for two consecutive years. The reproducibility of the results was also evaluated. As the result, GDS-15 had three reproducible factors specified as follows: factor I, “energy loss and pessimistic outlook”; factor II, “positive mental status (reversed)”; and factor III, “empty feeling.” Comparing our findings with a review of research in this area, positive items (excluding “feel full of energy”) seem to compose an universal factor. Factor I correlated best with quality of life, factor II with activities of daily living, and factor III with subjective cognitive function. These results suggest the GDS-15 can be used to assess the functional ability and quality of life, as well as depressive mood in older adults.     

Diagnostic performance of 18F-fluorothymidine PET/CT for primary colorectal cancer and its lymph node metastasis: comparison with 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose PET/CT

Purpose

To examine the diagnostic performance of ¹⁸F-fluorothymidine (FLT) PET/CT in primary and metastatic lymph node colorectal cancer foci in comparison with ¹⁸F-fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) PET/CT.

Methods

The study population comprised 28 patients with 30 newly diagnosed colorectal cancers who underwent surgical resection of the primary lesion and regional lymph nodes after both FLT and FDG PET/CT. The associations between SUVmax levels and pathological factors were evaluated using the Mann-Whitney U or Kruskal-Wallis test. Differences in diagnostic indexes for detecting nodal metastasis between the two tracers were estimated using the McNemar exact or χ ² test.

Results

All 30 primary cancers (43.0?±?20.0 mm, range 14 – 85 mm) were visualized by both tracers, but none of the FLT SUVmax values exceeded the FDG SUVmax values in any of the primary cancers (6.6?±?2.4 vs. 13.6?±?5.8, p?<?0.001). The sensitivity, specificity and accuracy for detecting nodal metastasis were 41 % (15/37), 98.8 % (493/499) and 94.8 % (508/536) for FDG PET/CT, and 32 % (12/37), 98.8 % (493/499) and 94.2 % (505/536) for FLT PET/CT, respectively. The sensitivity (p?=?0.45), specificity (p?=?0.68) and accuracy (p?=?0.58) were not different between the tracers. Nodal uptake of FLT and FDG was discordant in 7 (19 %) of 37 metastatic nodes. There were ten concordant true-positive nodes of which six showed higher FDG SUVmax and four showed higher FLT SUVmax, but the difference between FDG and FLT SUVmax was not significant (5.56?±?3.55 and 3.62?±?1.45, respectively; p?=?0.22).

Conclusion

FLT has the same potential as FDG in PET/CT for the diagnosis of primary and nodal foci of colorectal cancer despite significantly lower FLT uptake in primary foci.     

Rapid automated detection of ABL kinase domain mutations in imatinib-resistant patients

ABL tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI), imatinib is used for BCR-ABL⁺ leukemias. We developed an automatic method utilizing guanine-quenching probes (QP) to detect 17 kinds of mutations frequently observed in imatinib-resistance. Results were obtained from 100 μL of whole blood within 90 min by this method. Detected mutations were almost identical between QP method and direct sequencing. Furthermore, the mutation-biased PCR (MBP) was added to the QP method to increase sensitivity, resulting earlier detection of T315I mutation which was insensitive to any ABL TKIs. Thus, the QP and MBP-QP may become useful methods for the management of ABL TKI-treated patients.     

Frequency of CD45RO+ subset in CD4+CD25(high) regulatory T cells associated with progression of hepatocellular carcinoma

The purpose of this study was to assess the properties of CD4+CD25(high/low/negative) T cell subsets and analyze their relation with dendritic cells (DCs) in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). In HCC patients, the prevalence of CD45RO+ cells in CD4+CD25(high) T cells was increased and associated with higher frequencies of plasmacytoid DCs. Larger proportions of this T cell subset were detected in the patients with larger tumor burdens. These results suggest that increased frequencies of the CD45RO+ subset in CD4+CD25(high) Tregs in HCC patients may establish the immunosuppressive environment cooperatively with tolerogenic plasmacytoid DCs to promote disease progression of liver cancer.