Markers of oxidative stress and antioxidant activity in plasma and erythrocytes in neonatal respiratory distress syndrome

Markers of oxidative stress and antioxidant activity in plasma and erythrocytes were studied for 14 d after birth in infants with neonatal respiratory distress syndrome ( n = 9) and controls ( n = 36). In plasma, the total radical trapping antioxidant capacity and the chain-breaking antioxidants vitamin C, sulfhydryl groups and bilirubin were similar. The differences in uric acid levels were not consistent, but vitamin E levels and vitamin E/total-lipid ratio were lower in the neonatal respiratory distress group ( p < 0.01). In erythrocytes, the antioxidant enzymes glutathione peroxidase, glutathione reductase and superoxide dismutase did not differ postnatally. Indicators of oxidative damage in plasma (sulfhydryl/protein ratio and thiobarbituric acid reactive substances) showed the same postnatal course in both groups and were not influenced by oxygen therapy. In erythrocytes the reduced/oxidized glutathione ratio showed no consistent differences. In conclusion, this study, using erythrocytes and plasma, does not provide convincing evidence of oxidative damage and diminished antioxidant defenses in preterm infants with neonatal respiratory distress syndrome.     

Phosphoinositide 3-kinase is involved in the induction of the human sperm acrosome reaction downstream of tyrosine phosphorylation

In somatic cells phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI 3-kinase) is activated upon interaction with both receptor tyrosine kinases (RTK) and G- proteins resulting in the production of moieties involved in the inositol phospholipid signalling pathway. As G proteins, RTK and the inositol phospholipids have all been implicated in the human sperm acrosome reaction, experiments were carried out to determine whether PI 3-kinase was also involved in this phenomenon. Wortmannin is a selective inhibitor of PI 3-kinase and was shown to significantly inhibit the acrosome reaction induced by both mannose-bovine serum albumin (mannose-BSA) (10, 50 and 100 nM) and a polyclonal antibody raised against an extracellular region of the sperm zona receptor kinase (ZRK, at 100 nM only). Wortmannin did not inhibit the A23187- or progesterone-induced acrosome reaction. These results suggest that PI 3- kinase is involved in the human sperm acrosome reaction. The levels of tyrosine phosphorylation of sperm proteins as detected by Western blotting using antiphosphotyrosine antibodies was not affected by wortmannin in agonist (A23187 and mannose-BSA)-stimulated spermatozoa. This indicated that PI 3-kinase operates downstream of tyrosine phosphorylation in the signal transduction cascade which leads to the human sperm acrosome reaction.      

Influence of age and comorbidity on treatment choice and survival in elderly patients with breast cancer

Summary To determine the effect of age and comorbid diseases on treatment choice and survival, the medical records of 300 breast cancer patients of 55 years and older were reviewed. All patients were admitted to the Netherlands Cancer Institute (NKI) for first treatment between 1980 and 1987. Patients were classified according to severity level of comorbid diseases. Physicians were found to treat women of 75 years and older less often with adjuvant radiotherapy after a mastectomy, and more often to employ only primary endocrine treatment for local stage disease, as compared with younger patients. According to the treatment guidelines of the institute, the study sample was divided into patients who received standard vs. non-standard treatment. The treatment of 38 women (13.1%) did not correspond with the guidelines. Of these, 84% were 75 years and older and 50% had a severe comorbidity status. Logistic regression analysis indicated that advanced age, per se, was a better indicator of the risk of not being treated according to protocol than the comorbidity status. Cox multivariate analyses demonstrated that neither the severity of the comorbidity status nor the differences in treatment between younger and older patients had a significant effect on the risk of dying from breast cancer or on the risk of developing recurrences. In this analysis, age 75 years or more proved to be a significant and independent predictor of a worse overall and disease-specific survival as compared to age between 65–74 years.     

毛细管气相色谱法测定人血清中二十二碳六烯酸的浓度

毛细管气相色谱法测定人血清中二十二碳六烯酸的浓度李青翠张驰彭会明夏桂珠（北京医科大学药学院，北京１０００８３；山西省药品检验所，太原０３０００１）二十二碳六烯酸（ｃｉｓ４，７，１０，１３，１６，１９ｄｏｃｏｓａｈｅｘｅｎｏｉｃａｃｉｄ，Ｄ...     

Evaluation of a modified single-enzyme amplified fragment length polymorphism (SE-AFLP) technique for subtyping Salmonella enterica serotype Enteritidis

Salmonella enterica subsp. enterica serotype Enteritidis is not readily subtyped beyond the level of phage type (PT). Pulsed field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) is generally acknowledged to be the most discriminating typing method for Salmonella, but only a restricted variety of PFGE types has been described for S. enterica serotype Enteritidis. In the present study, a modification of the SE-AFLP typing method was used to investigate both outbreak and apparently sporadic isolates of S. enterica serotype Enteritidis belonging to different PTs and/or PFGE types. The method proved to be as discriminatory as PFGE when combined with phage typing, and provided subtyping data consistent with epidemiological information. Although the modified SE-AFLP typing method did not prove to achieve a superior discriminatory ability in resolving clusters, it has a high enough throughput for use in outbreak investigations. This method can be used in combination with other typing methods to obtain epidemiologically relevant subtyping data on S. enterica serotype Enteritidis.     

Pacemaker Lead Fracture Due to Twiddler's Syndrome

The authors report a case of pacemaker twiddler's syndrome that led to lead fracture and loss of consciousness. The role of chest X rays in the diagnosis of pacemaker twiddler's syndrome as well as the management of the syndrome is discussed.     

Progressive platelet activation with storage: evidence for shortened survival of activated platelets after transfusion

Platelets are known to become activated during storage, but it is unclear whether such activation affects recovery or survival after platelet concentrate (PC) transfusion. With the use of flow cytometry to determine the percentage of platelets expressing the alpha-granule membrane protein 140 (GMP-140), a known adhesive ligand appearing on the platelet surface after activation, several studies were conducted. These investigations evaluated 1) the occurrence of significant platelet activation over time in PCs (n = 46) stored under standard blood bank conditions; 2) the correlation between platelet activation and platelet recovery in normal subjects after PC storage (n = 12), as assessed by the recovery of Indium-labeled platelets; and 3) the recovery of activated and unactivated platelets in thrombocytopenic cancer patients transfused with standard PCs (n = 11). It was determined 1) that an increasing duration of storage of PC was associated with increasing platelet activation as measured by the percentage of platelets expressing GMP-140, progressing from a mean of 4 +/- 2 percent (SD) on the day of collection to a mean of 25 +/- 8 percent by 5 days of storage: 2) that, in normal subjects, posttransfusion recovery of autologous platelets stored for 2 to 4 days and then labeled with In111 was inversely correlated with the percentage of activated platelets in the transfused PC (r = -0.55, p = 0.05); and 3) that, when thrombocytopenic patients were transfused with standard PCs, the recovery of the activated platelets in the transfused PCs averaged only 38 +/- 15 percent of the number predicted by the absolute platelet increment.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)