Intestinal colonization & production of diarrhoea by enteroadherent-aggregative Escherichia coli.

The ability of HEp-2 cell adherent Esch. coli of aggregative phenotype (EA-Agg EC) to cause diarrhoea and to colonize the bowel of rabbits was studied. Thirty six rabbits were challenged with one of three EA-Agg EC strains (F23A; H766C and F17A-15, 3 and 3 rabbits respectively) or a control strain (K12-15 rabbits) in reversible ileal-tie in adult rabbit diarrhoea (RITARD) model. The animals were sacrificed 72 h post challenge. Severe diarrhoea occurred in greater number of F23A challenged rabbits than the controls (P < 0.05). Mucosal cultures from proximal and distal small intestine and colon yielded about 1000 times more Esch. coli in the test than control rabbits (P < 0.001 in each case). EA-Agg EC were consistently grown from mucosa in the test rabbits who commonly showed mild to moderate villous stunting and grade + to nuclear fragmentation (karyorrhexis) in the small and large bowel epithelium. The control animals had either normal villi or very mild villous stunting. Results comparable to F23A were obtained with the other two EA-Agg EC strains tested in a smaller number of animals.

Computer based application software for histopathological reporting system.

For better follow up of patient and the immediate retrieval of records, we have developed a computer based application software for histopathological reporting system (HIPRIS). With its help, among others, we can (i) retrieve the biopsy report of a patient from the accession number of the specimen; (ii) find out the number of cases for a particular period as well as can analyse cases by any relevant referral parameter like department, specialty and disease and (iii) find out the time gap between receiving the specimen and reporting of result. Our experience suggests that this system greatly improves the efficiency of the histopathological laboratory.