Treatment and outcomes of patients with chronic radiation proctitis. A single-center experience and review of the literature.

Chronic radiation proctitis is a frequent complication after radiotherapy for pelvic malignancies. It is reported that 1 to 5% of patients develop chronic radiation proctitis even with recent advances in external radiotherapy. Hematochezia, mucus discharge, urgency and tenesmus are common symptoms and they can vary in severity but bleeding is often the most debilitating to the patient.

Percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy (PEG), in elderly patients with dementia and anorexia. Medical and ethical issues regarding placement.

Background And Aims: Ethical and medico-legal issues reviews of Percutaneous Endoscopic Gastrostomy (PEG) placement in elderly patients is an important topic of international medical literature. PEG is often inappropriately placed in patients with not spontaneous oral feeding intake, cause of unrealistic expectations. We performed a critical review of the literature for placement of PEG in geriatric patients.

Endoscopic diagnosis and treatment of neuroendocrine tumors of the digestive system.

The authors evaluated the role of endoscopic techniques in the diagnosis and in the potential treatment of neuroendocrine tumors (NET) localized in the gastro-entero-pancreatic system, on the basis of their experience and of the international literature. NET are rare tumors that arise from neuroendocrine cells of the gastrointestinal tract and pancreas. It is a possibility that both the digestive endoscopy and EUS play an important role in the diagnosis, staging and surveillance of this disease.

BioEnterics Intragastric Balloon (BIB) versus Spatz Adjustable Balloon System (ABS): Our experience in the elderly.

The BioEnterics Intragastric Balloon (BIB) and the Spatz Adjustable Balloon System (ABS) are in fact recommended for weight reduction as a bridge to bariatric surgery. We retrospected studied patients with body mass index (BMI) and age ranges of 37-46 and 70-80 years, respectively, who had undergone BIB from January 2010 to July 2012 and prospected studied patients who had undergone Spatz balloon from July 2012 to August 2014. The aim of this study is to compare BIB and Spatz in terms of weight loss, complications, and maintenance of weight after removal.

Hexadecenoic Fatty Acid Isomers in Human Blood Lipids and Their Relevance for the Interpretation of Lipidomic Profiles.

Monounsaturated fatty acids (MUFA) are emerging health biomarkers, and in particular the ratio between palmitoleic acid (9cis-16:1) and palmitic acid (16:0) affords the delta-9 desaturase index that is increased in obesity. Recently, other positional and geometrical MUFA isomers belonging to the hexadecenoic family (C16 MUFA) were found in circulating lipids, such as sapienic acid (6cis-16:1), palmitelaidic acid (9trans-16:1) and 6trans-16:1. In this work we report: i) the identification of sapienic acid as component of human erythrocyte membrane phospholipids with significant increase in morbidly obese patients (n = 50) compared with age-matched lean controls (n = 50); and ii) the first comparison of erythrocyte membrane phospholipids (PL) and plasma cholesteryl esters (CE) in morbidly obese patients highlighting that some of their fatty acid levels have opposite trends: increases of both palmitic and sapienic acids with the decrease of linoleic acid (9cis,12cis-18:2, omega-6) in red blood cell (RBC) membrane PL were reversed in plasma CE, whereas the increase of palmitoleic acid was similar in both lipid species.

Automodification of PARP and fatty acid-based membrane lipidome as a promising integrated biomarker panel in molecular medicine.

Aim: Establishing by statistical analyses whether the analyses of auto-modified poly(ADP-ribose)polymerase and erythrocyte membrane fatty acid composition (Fat Profile(®)), separately or in tandem, help monitoring the physio-pathology of the cell, and correlate with diseases, if present.

Patients & Methods: Ninety five subjects were interviewed and analyzed blindly. Blood lymphocytes and erythrocytes were prepared to assay poly(ADP-ribose)polymerase automodification and fatty acid based membrane lipidome, respectively.

Lobular intraepithelial neoplasia arising within breast fibroadenoma.

Background: Fibroadenomas are the second most common breast pathology occurring in young women under the age of 35 years old. Fibroadenomas can be classified as simple or complex according to histological features. Complex fibroadenomas differ from simple fibroadenomas because of the presence of cysts (3 mm), sclerosing adenosis, epithelial calcifications, or papillary apocrine changes.

New technique for endoscopic removal of intragastric balloon placed for treatment of morbid obesity.

Background: Placement and removal of the intragastric balloon for obesity are performed endoscopically often under general anesthesia. We propose a safer and faster technique for endoscopic removal of the intragastric balloon using standard sedation.

Methods: In 87 obese patients, we performed 3 removal techniques: 1) standard gastroscope and foreign body forceps, 2) standard gastroscope and retrieval snare, 3) double-channel gastroscope and foreign body forceps plus symmetrical "shark model" polypectomy snare.

Arachidonate geometrical isomers generated by thiyl radicals: the relationship with trans lipids detected in biological samples.

The presence of trans fatty acids in mammalians is attributed to exogenous sources; nevertheless, trans isomers could be easily formed by free radical-catalyzed isomerization processes in vivo. The isomerization of methyl arachidonate (all-cis isomer) catalyzed by thiyl radical is proposed as a methodology applicable in biochemical laboratories, which produces mono- and di-trans isomers. Carbon-13 nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy shows that the carbon atom in position 15 is characteristic for each mono- and di-trans isomer.

Differential TAG-72 epitope expression in breast cancer and lymph node metastases: a marker of a more aggressive phenotype.

We analysed the differential expression pattern of the three distinct TAG-72 carbohydrate epitopes detected by monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) B72.3, CC83 and CC49 in a consecutive series of 114 patients with primary breast cancer and in 39 synchronous lymph node metastases. B72.