Giant-cell tumor of the sacrum

We have presented a case of a patient with sacral giant-cell tumor and reviewed the literature. This is a rare disease originating from the mesenchyme of bone marrow which grows out through the cortex. It is essentially benign but behaves like a malignant tumor in view of frequent recurrences and a high incidence of malignant transformation. Cure can be achieved only by complete extirpation of tumor along with surrounding soft tissue.     

Persistent immunoglobulinuria in irreversible renal allograft rejection in humans.

To evaluate the extent of injury in short- and long-term renal allografts, the urinary excretion of IgG, IgA, and IgM was observed during acute rejection crisis. In reversible rejection, treatment resulted in prompt correction of immunoglobulinuria, whereas in irreversible crisis urinary immunoglobulin levels continuously increased in spite of the same antirejection treatment. A good prognosis in long-term allografts was shown by low levels of immunoglobulinuria; unstable graft function had higher levels. Immunoglobulinuria can be used as an additional test to evaluate the reversibility of acute rejection, and also has significance in the long-term situation.     

Endoscopic submucosal dissection for early gastric cancer: Quo vadis?

The diagnosis of early gastric cancer(EGC) is of great interest because its endoscopic and surgical treatment presents the best chance for a cure.With technical development,endoscopic submucosal dissection(ESD) has been widely performed for the curative treatment of EGC in Korea.Multinational studies of ESD for EGC will be the next missions that overcome these limitations and global guidelines will be processed for ESD for EGC.     

Long-term clinical and radiologic results of small cerebral aneurysms embolized with 1 or 2 detachable coils

BACKGROUND: Small cerebral aneurysms embolized with only 1 or 2 detachable coils often seem unstable and unsatisfactory. We tried to assess the long-term results of such embolized aneurysms. METHODS: Among 231 intracranial saccular aneurysms embolized at the Asan Medical Center between July 1995 and July 2004, 27 small aneurysms were occluded with only 1 (n = 12) or 2 (n = 15) detachable coils. Clinical and radiologic results were evaluated retrospectively for the involved patients. RESULTS: For the 1- and 2-coiled aneurysms, respectively, the mean dome sizes were 3.0 and 4.6 mm and the mean neck sizes were 1.9 and 2.7 mm. Most of the aneurysms were in the posterior circulation (19/27, 70%) and were found after bleeding (17/27, 63%). At the end of the embolization, complete occlusion in 19 aneurysms, residual neck in 1 aneurysm, and residual aneurysm in 7 aneurysms were attained angiographically. The mean packing ratios were 17.9% and 20.7% for the 1- and 2-coiled aneurysms, respectively. The mean clinical follow-up period of the patients was 41 months. No patient showed evidence of rebleeding; in addition, 1 patient with 1 coil and 2 patients with 2 coils were not followed up after discharge. Among the 10 follow-up DSAs or MRAs acquired after more than 8 months, radiologic major recurrences were detected in 2 patients after 10 and 15 months and second embolizations were done. CONCLUSIONS: Although the 1- and 2-coiled small aneurysms with a relatively low packing ratio seemed unstable, they showed a relatively low incidence of rebleeding and recurrence.     

Cross-Reactive Antibodies to Target Proteins are Dependent upon Oligomannose Glycosylated Epitopes in HTLV-1 Associated Neurological Disease

Our lab recently identified a cross-reactive antibody response between human T-lymphotropic virus type-1-p24-(gag) (HTLV-1-p24-(gag)) and peroxiredoxin-1 (PrX-1) as potentially contributing to the pathogenesis of HTLV-1 associated neurological disease via molecular mimicry. These targets proteins were glycosylated, yet the glycan side chains immunoreactive with the immunoglobulins were unknown. Using a combination of lectin isolation and serial enzymatic deglycosylation of glycoproteins, we determined that the immunoreactive epitopes contained branched oligomannose side chains. These data suggest that post-translational glycosylation specifically related to oligomannose immunoreactivity to both the infecting and host antigens may contribute to molecular mimicry and be important in the pathogenesis of HTLV-1 associated neurological disease.