Medicine
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Sarcoidosis is a multisystem granulomatous disease which is observed worldwide. Sarcoidosis is one of the common causes of ocular inflammation. The choroidal vascularity index, defined as the ratio of the luminal area to the total choroidal area, is used as one of the biomarkers for assessing the choroid vascular state. ⋯ Both the sarcoidosis and control groups had similar measured values for central corneal thickness, corneal volume, anterior chamber depth, anterior chamber volume, and iridocorneal angle (P > .05). Mean retinal nerve fiber layer, retinal arteriole and venule caliber, and choroidal thickness measurements did not differ significantly between the groups (P > .05). Sarcoidosis patients in quiescent period have similar choroidal vascularity index and thickness with healthy controls.
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Acute fatty liver of pregnancy (AFLP) is a rare and potentially fatal complication that occurs in the third trimester or early postpartum period. The diagnosis of AFLP is based on typical clinical and laboratory features and imaging examinations. ⋯ Special attention should be paid to mothers with AFLP after in vitro fertilization-embryo transfer. The clinical presentation of AFLP is variable, hence laboratory features and ultrasound examination may be important methods for screening for AFLP.
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We aimed to characterize solitary pulmonary nodule (SPN) using imaging parameters for F-18 fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) positron emission tomography/computed tomography (PET/CT) or enhanced CT corrected by tumor shadow disappearance rate (TDR) to reflect the tissue density. We enrolled 51 patients with an SPN who underwent PET/CT and chest CT with enhancement. The FDG uptake of SPN was evaluated using maximum standardized uptake value (SUVmax) on PET/CT. ⋯ High value of HUpeak-pre (≥38) was a significant factor to characterize SPN (P = .002) with lower tissue density (TDR ≥42%, n = 29). The combined approach using TDR-corrected parameters had better predictive performance to characterize SPN than SUVmax only (P = .031). Applying imaging parameters such as SUVmax or HUpeak-pre in consideration of tissue density calculated with TDR could contribute to accurate characterization of SPN.
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Currently, endoscopic submucosal dissection (ESD) has gradually become the diagnosis and treatment of choice for initial esophageal cancer. However, the formation of esophageal stricture after ESD is one of its important complications. In this paper, we intend to identify the risk factors of esophageal stricture to develop a nomogram model to predict the risk of esophageal stricture and validate this model. ⋯ The prediction performance of the model was verified by the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve, the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of the model was 0.889, and the sensitivity and specificity were 80.00% and 91.28%, respectively, indicating that the prediction performance of the model was good; The calibration curve constructed by internal cross-validation suggested that the predicted results of the nomogram agreed well with the actual observed values. The nomogram model has a high accuracy for predicting esophageal stricture after esophageal ESD and is extremely important to reduce or avoid the occurrence of esophageal stricture. But it needs more external and prospective validation.
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One of the most important reasons for avoiding percutaneous transhepatic gall bladder drainage (PTGBD) is the deterioration of quality of life (QOL). However, there is no study comparing the QOL between primary laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC) and LC following PTGBD. Among the LC patients, 69 non-PTGBD patients and 21 PTGBD patients were included after excluding the patients with malignant disease or who needed additional common bile duct procedures. ⋯ Comparative analysis of the 2 groups showed no significant difference in global heath scale either preoperative or postoperatively, while the functional scale and emotional scale were better in the PTGBD group compared to the non-PTGBD group. Regarding the symptom scale, postoperative dyspnea and perioperative diarrhea were better in the PTGBD group. LC following an interval from earlier PTGBD that targets acute cholecystitis or complicated GB had little to no impact on QOL when compared to standard LC.