Strong Catholic identity key to effective health care apostolate

Catholic health care facilities must define what it means to be human and what it means to be Catholic before confronting current moral and ethical issues.     

Impact of IL-28B polymorphisms on pegylated interferon plus ribavirin treatment response in children and adolescents infected with HCV genotypes 1 and 4

IL-28B polymorphisms are predictors of response to therapy in adults infected with hepatitis C. We do not know whether they are markers of response to therapy in children and adolescents. The aim of this study was to determine whether single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the IL-28B gene could influence the probability of response to therapy compared with other known baseline prognostic factors and correlate with clinical findings in pediatric patients infected with hepatitis C virus (HCV) genotypes 1 or 4. We determined three SNPs of IL-28B (rs12979860, rs12980275, and rs8099917) in 82 patients with chronic HCV infection treated with pegylated interferon alpha and ribavirin (peg-IFNα/RBV). Treatment response and clinical data were analyzed. Overall, sustained virological response (SVR) was achieved by 45 % of patients infected with difficult-to-treat HCV genotypes 1 and 4. Except for IL-28B polymorphisms, there was no association of SVR with any other clinical data. IL-28B rs12979860 CC [odds ratio (OR), 6.81; p?=?0.001] and rs8099917 TT (OR,?3.14; p?=?0.013) genotypes were associated with higher SVR rates. IL-28B rs12980275 was not significantly associated with SVR (p?=?0.058). Only the distribution between CC and CT–TT genotypes of rs12979860 significantly differentiated patients achieving early virological response (EVR) (OR,?10.0; p?=?0.011). Children with the rs12979860 CC genotype had significantly higher baseline viral load compared with CT–TT patients (p?=?0.010). In children and adolescents chronically infected with HCV genotypes 1 and 4, IL-28B rs12979860 and rs8099917 polymorphisms were the only predictors of response to peg-IFN/RBV.     

Palmatine: A review of pharmacological properties and pharmacokinetics

The aim of this review is to collect together the results of the numerous studies over the last two decades on the pharmacological properties of palmatine published in scientific databases like Scopus and PubMed, which are scattered across different publications. Palmatine, an isoquinoline alkaloid from the class of protoberberines, is a yellow compound present in the extracts from different representatives of Berberidaceae, Papaveraceae, Ranunculaceae, and Menispermaceae. It has been extensively used in traditional medicine of Asia in the treatment of jaundice, liver‐related diseases, hypertension, inflammation, and dysentery. New findings describe its possible applications in the treatment of civilization diseases like central nervous system‐related problems. This review intends to let this alkaloid come out from the shade of a more frequently described alkaloid: berberine. The toxicity, pharmacokinetics, and biological activities of this protoberberine alkaloid will be developed in this work.     

Epidemiological studies on Echinococcus multilocularis in red foxes in north-west Poland

The studies were carried out in 15 provinces of North-West part of Poland in the years 1994 - 1997 under a regime of strict laboratory safety regulation. The intestine of 1909 red foxes were examined for the presence of Echinococcus multilocularis according to the method of Eckert et al (1991). The intestines were divided finto four to six sections and fifteen smears were prepared from each animal under study. Foxes infected with E. multilocularis were detected in 8 provinces. The average prevalence rate in these provinces was 1.20 per cent. Of special interest fis the finding in Slupsk and Gdafisk regions, where 9.6 per cent of foxes were infected with E. multilocularis. In comparison with some other European endemic regions the prevalence rates of E. multilocularis in Poland was low, except for the Stupsk-Gdańsk area.     

Familial cortical dysplasia caused by mutation in the mammalian target of rapamycin regulator NPRL3

We describe first cousin sibling pairs with focal epilepsy, one of each pair having focal cortical dysplasia (FCD) IIa. Linkage analysis and whole‐exome sequencing identified a heterozygous germline frameshift mutation in the gene encoding nitrogen permease regulator‐like 3 (NPRL3). NPRL3 is a component of GAP Activity Towards Rags 1, a negative regulator of the mammalian target of rapamycin complex 1 signaling pathway. Immunostaining of resected brain tissue demonstrated mammalian target of rapamycin activation. Screening of 52 unrelated individuals with FCD identified 2 additional patients with FCDIIa and germline NPRL3 mutations. Similar to DEPDC5, NPRL3 mutations may be considered as causal variants in patients with FCD or magnetic resonance imaging–negative focal epilepsy. ANN NEUROL 2016;79:132–137     

Automated alignment of perioperative MRI scans: A technical note and application in pediatric epilepsy surgery

Conventional image registration utilizing brain voxel information may be erroneous in a neurosurgical setting due to pathology and surgery‐related anatomical distortions. We report a novel application of an automated image registration procedure based on skull segmentation for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans acquired before, during and after surgery (i.e., perioperative). The procedure was implemented to assist analysis of intraoperative brain shift in 11 pediatric epilepsy surgery cases, each of whom had up to five consecutive perioperative MRI scans. The procedure consisted of the following steps: (1) Skull segmentation using tissue classification tools. (2) Estimation of rigid body transformation between image pairs using registration driven by the skull segmentation. (3) Composition of transformations to provide transformations between each scan and a common space. The procedure was validated using locations of three types of reference structural landmarks: the skull pin sites, the eye positions, and the scalp skin surface, detected using the peak intensity gradient. The mean target registration error (TRE) scores by skull pin sites and scalp skin rendering were around 1 mm and <1 mm, respectively. Validation by eye position demonstrated >1 mm TRE scores, suggesting it is not a reliable reference landmark in surgical scenarios. Comparable registration accuracy was achieved between opened and closed skull scan pairs and closed and closed skull scan pairs. Our procedure offers a reliable registration framework for processing intrasubject time series perioperative MRI data, with potential of improving intraoperative MRI‐based image guidance in neurosurgical practice. Hum Brain Mapp 37:3530–3543, 2016. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.