Cooling-induced brushite crystallization in urine as a predictive risk marker for calcium kidney stone recurrence.

Kidney stones have a high recurrence rate-10% within 5 years and 50% within 10. Crystalluria reflects the urinary physicochemical environment and may serve as a recurrence marker, but key crystals like brushite are rarely detected under ambient conditions. This study aimed to identify novel recurrence markers by inducing crystallization through urine cooling and analyzing crystal composition.

Leveraging Large Language Models in Extracting Drug Safety Information from Prescription Drug Labels.

Introduction: Adverse drug reactions (ADRs), including those resulting from drug interactions, remain a leading cause of morbidity and mortality. Structured product labels (SPLs) serve as a primary source for drug safety information. Having machine-readable product labels, including adverse reactions (ARs) and drug interactions, readily available would allow researchers to streamline medication safety studies.

Implementing a context-augmented large language model to guide precision cancer medicine.

The rapid expansion of molecularly informed therapies in oncology, coupled with evolving regulatory FDA approvals, poses a challenge for oncologists seeking to integrate precision cancer medicine into patient care. Large Language Models (LLMs) have demonstrated potential for clinical applications, but their reliance on general knowledge limits their ability to provide up-to-date and niche treatment recommendations. To address this challenge, we developed a RAG-LLM workflow augmented with Molecular Oncology Almanac (MOAlmanac), a curated precision oncology knowledge resource, and evaluated this approach relative to alternative frameworks (i.

Disruption of Microhomology-mediated End-joining in Ewing Sarcoma.

Unlabelled: Ewing sarcoma (EwS) is a group of bone and soft tissue cancers in children and young adults. The EWS-FLI1 protein, the oncogenic driver in EwS, is a fusion of the FET protein, EWSR1, at its amino terminus, with the carboxy terminus of the transcription factor, FLI1. Since EwS cells have pronounced sensitivity to radiation and chemotherapy-induced DNA damage, the role of EWS-FLI1 in DNA repair is likely.

OnSIDES database: Extracting adverse drug events from drug labels using natural language processing models.

Background: Adverse drug events (ADEs) are the fourth leading cause of death in the US and cost billions of dollars annually in increased healthcare costs. However, few machine-readable databases of ADEs exist, limiting our capacity to study drug safety on a broader, systematic scale. Recent advances in natural language processing methods, such as BERT models, present an opportunity to accurately extract relevant information from unstructured biomedical text.

Clinical remission of mild-to-moderate asthma: Rates, contributing factors, and stability.

Background: Although clinical remission (CR) of severe asthma has been extensively investigated, CR of mild-to-moderate asthma remains unexplored.

Objective: This study aimed to determine CR rates, contributing factors, and stability in patients with mild-to-moderate asthma.

Methods: We retrospectively analyzed 263 patients with asthma.

Development of Adult T-Cell Leukemia/Lymphoma During Treatment with PD-L1 Inhibitor for Lung Cancer.

Advancements in immunotherapy, the phenomenon of hyperprogression in cancer patients, have garnered increasing attention. We herein report a case of acute adult T-cell leukemia/lymphoma (ATL) that developed after administration of the PD-L1 inhibitor durvalumab in a patient with lung cancer. Although the patient was a carrier of human T-cell leukemia virus type 1 (HTLV-1), this was unknown prior to durvalumab treatment.

[Anaplastic Carcinoma with Osteoclast-Like Giant Cells of the Pancreas and Synchronous Liver Metastasis That Was Successfully Treated with Surgery and Chemotherapy-A Case Report].

A 76-year-old man presented with a pancreatic cystic lesion on magnetic resonance imaging before surgery for bladder cancer. Endoscopic ultrasound(EUS)suggested a malignant tumor such as a neuroendocrine neoplasm, but EUS-fine-needle aspiration was not performed. In addition, a single tumor 10 mm in size was found in the liver(S5), and liver metastasis was suspected.

Continuous process design of the microwave chemical recycling of waste plastics using microwave-absorbing heating elements.

Conventional pyrolysis methods to chemically recycle plastic waste require significant energy input owing to inefficient energy transfer from the heat sources to plastics and the generation of excess CO. Accordingly, there is an urgent need to develop alternative methods for the chemical recycling of waste plastics to limit global warming. In this study, the use of microwaves (MWs) as an efficient energy source for pyrolysis and chemical recycling.

Calcium phosphate controls nucleation and growth of calcium oxalate crystal phases in kidney stones.

Kidney stone disease is a serious disease due to the severe pain it causes, high morbidity, and high recurrence rate. Notably, calcium oxalate stones are the most common type of kidney stone. Calcium oxalate appears in two forms in kidney stones: the stable phase, monohydrate (COM), and the metastable phase, dihydrate (COD).

The impact of crystal phase transition on the hardness and structure of kidney stones.

Calcium oxalate kidney stones, the most prevalent type of kidney stones, undergo a multi-step process of crystal nucleation, growth, aggregation, and secondary transition. The secondary transition has been rather overlooked, and thus, the effects on the disease and the underlying mechanism remain unclear. Here, we show, by periodic micro-CT images of human kidney stones in an ex vivo incubation experiment, that the growth of porous aggregates of calcium oxalate dihydrate (COD) crystals triggers the hardening of the kidney stones that causes difficulty in lithotripsy of kidney stone disease in the secondary transition.

Safety and effectiveness of avelumab in patients with Merkel cell carcinoma in general clinical practice in Japan: Post-marketing surveillance.

Avelumab, a programmed cell death ligand 1 blocking antibody, was approved for its first indication in Japan in September 2017 to treat unresectable Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC). Given that the pivotal JAVELIN Merkel 200 study only included a few Japanese patients, this post-marketing surveillance (PMS) evaluated the safety and effectiveness outcomes of patients with MCC who received avelumab in general clinical practice in Japan. This prospective, non-comparative, multicenter PMS included data from all patients with unresectable MCC who received avelumab between November 22, 2017 (avelumab launch date) and October 31, 2019.

Using machine learning probabilities to identify effects of COVID-19.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), the disease caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) virus, has had extensive economic, social, and public health impacts in the United States and around the world. To date, there have been more than 600 million reported infections worldwide with more than 6 million reported deaths. Retrospective analysis, which identified comorbidities, risk factors, and treatments, has underpinned the response.

[A case of rectal cancer with immune thrombocytopenic purpura that achieved a complete response to continued chemotherapy with eltrombopag].

A 73-year-old male patient with postoperative recurrent rectal cancer developed thrombocytopenia after XELOX therapy. Thrombocytopenia persisted despite chemotherapy discontinuation;therefore, he was referred to our department for further evaluation. Bone marrow specimen examination revealed increased immature megakaryocytes and blood test results revealed elevated platelet-associated immunoglobulin G (PA-IgG) levels, leading to immune thrombocytopenic purpura diagnosis.

Quantitative analysis of calcium oxalate monohydrate and dihydrate for elucidating the formation mechanism of calcium oxalate kidney stones.

We sought to identify and quantitatively analyze calcium oxalate (CaOx) kidney stones on the order of micrometers, with a focus on the quantitative identification of calcium oxalate monohydrate (COM) and dihydrate (COD). We performed Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD), and microfocus X-ray computed tomography measurements (microfocus X-ray CT) and compared their results. An extended analysis of the FTIR spectrum focusing on the 780 cm-1 peak made it possible to achieve a reliable analysis of the COM/COD ratio.

Anomalous Crystal Shapes of Topological Crystalline Insulators.

Understanding crystal shapes is a fundamental subject in surface science. It is now well studied how chemical bondings determine crystal shapes via dependence of surface energies on surface orientations. Meanwhile, discoveries of topological materials have led us to a new paradigm in surface science, and one can expect that topological surface states may affect surface energies and crystal facets in an unconventional way.

A novel approach in creating nephrostomy using a double-lumen access sheath during endoscopic combined intrarenal surgery.

Background: This study aimed to evaluate the safety and efficacy of an inner ureteral access sheath (i-UAS) with a double-lumen channel used in ureteroscopic lithotripsy (URS) as a dilator for the percutaneous tract in endoscopic combined intrarenal surgery (ECIRS).

Methods: This was a single-center cohort study conducted from January 2016 to April 2020. We used an i-UAS as a dilator and a double-lumen catheter to insert a safety guidewire during the creation of the nephrostomy tract in ECIRS.

Multicolor imaging of calcium-binding proteins in human kidney stones for elucidating the effects of proteins on crystal growth.

The pathogenesis of kidney stone formation includes multi-step processes involving complex interactions between mineral components and protein matrix. Calcium-binding proteins in kidney stones have great influences on the stone formation. The spatial distributions of these proteins in kidney stones are essential for evaluating the in vivo effects of proteins on the stone formation, although the actual distribution of these proteins is still unclear.

Risk Factors for Failure of Endoscopic Management of Stone-related Ureteral Strictures.

Purpose: To investigate factors determining the outcomes of endoscopic management for stone-related ureteral stricture.

Materials And Methods: Data of patients who underwent endoscopic surgery for ureteral stricture due to stones from January 2016 to April 2020 were retrospectively analyzed. We compared cases successfully treated with endoscopic surgery with cases that resulted in failure.

Low bone mineral density is a potential risk factor for symptom onset and related with hypocitraturia in urolithiasis patients: a single-center retrospective cohort study.

Background: Patients with urolithiasis have a lower bone mineral density (BMD) than those without stones, suggesting a potential correlation between calcium stone formation and bone resorption disorders, including osteopenia and osteoporosis.

Methods: To investigate the influence of BMD on clinical outcomes in urolithiasis, we performed a single-center retrospective cohort study to analyze patients with urolithiasis who underwent both BMD examination and 24-h urine collection between 2006 and 2015. Data from the national cross-sectional surveillance of the Japanese Society on Urolithiasis Research in 2015 were utilized, and additional data related to urinary tract stones were obtained from medical records.

Robot-Assisted Fluoroscopy Versus Ultrasound-Guided Renal Access for Nephrolithotomy: A Phantom Model Benchtop Study.

To evaluate the feasibility of robot-assisted fluoroscopy-guided (RAG) puncture and to compare RAG puncture, utilizing a novel robot system for percutaneous renal access, with ultrasound-guided (USG) puncture. We conducted a benchtop study with a renal phantom model using the automated needle targeting with an X-ray system. Seventeen urologists participated in this study and performed RAG and USG phantom punctures.

Hemothorax during miniaturized endoscopic combined intrarenal surgery under ureteroscope-assisted ultrasound-guided access.

Introduction: Hemothorax is a rare but life-threatening complication following mini-endoscopic combined intrarenal surgery. Herein, we describe a patient with left staghorn kidney stone who presented with hemothorax following mini-endoscopic combined intrarenal surgery under ureteroscope-assisted ultrasound-guided access.

Case Presentation: A 47-year-old woman with left staghorn kidney stone underwent mini-endoscopic combined intrarenal surgery, after which she developed shortness of breath.

Evaluation of the Dwell-Time and Dose Difference in Intravesical Bacillus Calmette-Guèrin Therapy.

Objective: Bacillus Calmette-Guèrin (BCG) intravesical therapy is currently established using a low dose because of the high incidence of side-effects. Moreover, shortening the dwell time of BCG is conducted in some facilities owing to the complications associated with a long dwell time after injection. The method of BCG administration varies in each facility and even with each doctor.

Identification of new urinary risk markers for urinary stones using a logistic model and multinomial logit model.

Background: Risk assessment for urinary stones has been mainly based on urinary biochemistry. We attempted to identify the risk factors for urinary stones by statistically analyzing urinary biochemical and inflammation-related factors.

Methods: Male participants (age, 20-79 years) who visited Nagoya City University Hospital were divided into three groups: a control group (n = 48) with no history of stones and two stone groups with calcium oxalate stone experience (first-time group, n = 22; recurring group, n = 40).

Outcomes and Complications of Simultaneous Laparoscopic Cystectomy and Laparoscopic Nephroureterectomy with Umbilical Reduced Port Surgery.

Objective: In recent years, although reduced port surgeries (RPS) have been reported for many urological diseases, there have been no reports regarding simultaneous laparoscopic cystectomy and unilateral or bilateral nephroureterectomy with umbilical RPS. Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate outcomes and complications of simultaneous laparoscopic cystectomy and unilateral or bilateral nephroureterectomy with umbilical RPS. Methods: We performed a preliminary case series of 4 patients with synchronous upper urinary tract (UUT) tumor and invasive bladder cancer who underwent simultaneous laparoscopic cystectomy and unilateral or bilateral nephroureterectomy with umbilical RPS between 2014 and 2017 at our hospital.