Update on Gastrointestinal Stromal Tumors for Radiologists

The management of gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GISTs) has evolved significantly in the last two decades due to better understanding of their biologic behavior as well as development of molecular targeted therapies. GISTs with exon 11 mutation respond to imatinib whereas GISTs with exon 9 or succinate dehydrogenase subunit mutations do not. Risk stratification models have enabled stratifying GISTs according to risk of recurrence and choosing patients who may benefit from adjuvant therapy. Assessing response to targeted therapies in GIST using conventional response criteria has several potential pitfalls leading to search for alternate response criteria based on changes in tumor attenuation, volume, metabolic and functional parameters. Surveillance of patients with GIST in the adjuvant setting is important for timely detection of recurrences.

Recognition of heart sound based on distribution of Choi-Williams

IntroductionTo realize noninvasive diagnosis and early diagnosis of coronary heart disease, the study proposes a new time-frequency method for analyzing heart sound signals. This method is based on Choi-Williams Distribution (CWD).MethodsCWD distribution is developed and modified from Wigner Ville distribution (WVD). To solve the problem of cross-term interference existing in WVD there is an improved version of WVD, called Choi-Williams Distribution (CWD), which introduces the smoothing window as the kernel function and deals with the time-frequency analysis of heart sound signal.ResultsThe improved method has good performance and can be implemented simply without much increase of operation complexity.ConclusionIn this paper, 21 cases of heart sound signals are acquired from the outpatients and hospitalized patients with coronary heart diseases. The research results of 21 cases show that the CWD method can be used to analyze heart sounds. It accurately identifies the 9 cases of heart sounds of health people and 12 cases of heart sounds of patients with coronary heart disease. Besides, the CWD displays obvious differences between heart sounds of healthy people and abnormal heart sounds. The contour line of heart sounds from healthy people shows the following characteristics: concise, columnar and non-divergence; while the contour line of abnormal heart sounds is divergent and has many columnar links. These research shows that CWD method can effectively distinguish heart sounds between healthy people and patients with coronary heart disease.

Effects of Methanol Extract of Piper chaba Stem Bark on Acute Inflammation in Rats.

The plant Piper chaba Hunter (Piperaceae), a climbing glabrous shrub grows in plenty in southern Bangladesh. Popularly known as 'Choi' it is used as spices and believed to have medicinal value in a wide variety of disease conditions including arthritis, asthma, bronchitis and piles. In the present study, effect of methanol extract of Piper chaba stem bark on acute inflammation has been reported. The anti-inflammatory effect was studied in rats by injecting 0.1ml of 1% carrageenan suspension into the planter surface, where oedema of the rat's hind paw was used as an index of acute inflammation. Methanol extract of Piper chaba stem bark given orally 1 hour before injection at doses of 125 and 250 mg/kg body weight, produced significant (p< 0.05) anti inflammatory effect compared to control and the percentage of inhibition of oedema formation was 33% and 35% respectively, which however was less compared to aspirin (46%) and hydrocortisone (56%). The result suggest that in case of acute inflammation, Piper chaba stem bark possess mild to moderate anti inflammatory effect compared to that of aspirin and hydrocortisone.

Occurrence of Clubroot on Pak-Choi Caused by Plasmodiophora brassicae

Clubroot symptoms occurred severely on roots of Pak-Choi (Brassica campestris ssp. chinensis) grown in greenhouses in Gwangju city, Gyeonggi province, Korea in September, 2008. The incidence of the disease symptoms reached as high as 90% in three greenhouses investigated. The root galls collected from the greenhouses were sectioned using a scalpel and observed by light microscope. Many resting spores were found in the cells of the root gall tissues. Suspension of resting spores was prepared from the root galls and inoculated to roots of healthy Pak-Choi plants. Each of five resting spore suspensions caused clubroot symptoms on the roots, which were similar to those observed during the greenhouse survey. Resting spores of the pathogen were observed in the cells of the affected roots. The clubroot pathogen was identified as Plasmodiophora brassicae based on its morphological and pathological characteristics. This is the first report that Plasmodiophora brassicae causes clubroot of Pak-Choi.

Single Hair Transplantation for Cicatrical Eyebrow Alopecia

PURPOSE: Single hair transplantation for eyebrow loss has been considered as a good method of achieving natural appearance of eyebrow. To date, however, no study has reported the survival rate following single hair transplantation for cicatricial eyebrow alopecia. METHODS: We performed single hair transplantation using Choi hair transplanter for 49 cases of scarring eyebrow loss from March 2003 to March 2006. Of these cases, 33 could be under a follow-up postoperatively for more than seven months. These 33 cases comprised 20 men and 13 women. Mean follow-up period was 12 months (7-36 months). In 17 patients(51.5%), 100 to 200 hairs were unilaterally transplanted. RESULTS: Following initial hair transplantation, the surgical outcome was excellent in 11 cases(33.3%), good in 12 cases(36.4%), fair or poor in the remaining ten cases(30.3%). All procedures were done under intravenous sedation and local or regional block anesthesia. It took about one and a half hours for us to transplant 200 hairs. The shape of eyebrow was aesthetically acceptable with a good direction and an ideal inclination of hairs. No patients developed notable complications, while 30 percent had a low survival rate. CONCLUSION: Single hair transplantation using Choi hair transplanter is a safe, effective surgical method for scarring eyebrow loss.

Laparoscopic Burch Colposuspension with the Choi's Hook / 대한산부인과학회지

OBJECTIVE: Burch operation has been effective method for the treatment of stress incontinence. Burch operation is a well-accepted procedure for treating stress urinary incontinence secondary to urethral hypermobility without intrinsic sphincter deficiency and is the reference standard with which other procedures are compared. This study is to evaluate the effectiveness of the Choi's hook in laparoscopic Burch operation. METHODS: This study included 47 patients who had undergone laparoscopic Burch operation from October 2000 through March 2005. Of these 47 patients, 27 patients underwent traditional laparoscopic Burch operation (Group 1) and 20 patients underwent laparoscopic Burch operation with Choi's Hook on anchoring the endopelvic fascia to the Cooper's ligament (Group 2). RESULTS: The mean age of patients of Group 1 was 55.6+/-9.37 years of age and that of Group 2 was 56.0+/-5.93 years of age. There is no difference in the mean age of patients (P>0.05). The mean operating time was 90.5+/-15.32 minutes for Group 1 and 38.5+/-10.14 minute for Group 2. The mean operating time was shorter in Group 2 than Group 1 (P0.05). CONCLUSION: We performed laparoscopic Burch operation with the Choi's Hook on anchoring the endopelvic fascia to the Cooper's ligament. When we compared traditional laparoscopic Burch operation with laparoscopic Burch operation with Choi's Hook, we could shorten the operation time using the Choi's Hook.

cDNA-AFLP Reveals Variation of Sequence Region trnF-ndhJ in Cytoplasmic Male Sterile Chinese Cabbage-pak-choi / 生物化学与生物物理进展

By means of cDNA amplified fragment length polymorphism(cDNA-AFLP) technique, a fragment P1708 was amplified from Polima cytoplasmic male sterile Chinese cabbage-pak-choi (Brassica campestris L. ssp. chinenesis Makino, syn, B. rapa L. ssp. chinenesis) 'Bpol97-05A'. RT-PCR showed that this fragment was specifically expressed in male sterile material. Sequencing and BLAST search in GenBank database indicated that P1708 had 100% homolog with chloroplast ndhJ-trnF gene region except a 54 bp insertion. Gene specific primer pairs were synthesized according to ndhJ-trnF gene region and two fragments about 1 900 bp were amplified respectively using genomic DNA templates of Polima cabbage and male fertile oilseed rape. The sequencing results showed that the gene region ndhJ-trnF of Polima cabbage contained two 54 bp repeats and some variation sites. The repeat part shared the same sequence as trnF gene except three bases at 5′ ends. For the insertion of 108 bp sequence, a new open reading frame was created.

The History of Urology in Korea (1910-1945) / 의사학

The urological tradition of Korea dates back to the ancient period. The special urologist of Western medicine is produced in recent times. In the past there was no special discipline of urology in Eastern as well as Western medicine, which was studied as a part of internal medicine or general surgery. Therefore there was neither urology part nor special urologist in the hospitals established in Korea during the late 19th century. Japan annexed Korea in 1910 and reorganized Daehan Hospital into the Government-General Hospital, where the dermatology part was built as outpatient clinic in October 1. The Associated Medical Training Institute came to teach dermatology, so a Japanese instructor came there. After then it was changed into Kyungsung Medical College where also was dermatology instituted, but the patients of urological problems were cared in internal medicine or general surgery part. The first Korean surgeon who entered as assistant the dermatology department of the Government General Hospital is Kim Kyo-Chang, who graduated Daehan Hospital Medical School in 1911. In 1916, when the Government General Medical Training Institute was changed to Kyungsung Medical College, Choo Young-Son, a graduate of Chiba Medical College, entered the dermatology department and had worked until 1922. Then Oh Won-Son entered there as surgeon and worked during the period Watanabe, and then Hirota was the chief of the department. He was promoted assistant professor in 1926, and appointed as instructor in 1928 when Kyungsung Medical College came to be independent. He taught dermatology there until 1932 as working in his own clinic in downtown. The chief surgeon of this period was Kataoka. In 1929 Hong Jin-Ku, who entered there as assistant in 1928, was appointed as instructor but he resigned the next year. From 1933 to 1940 Kim Sung-Whan cared patients as well as taught students as instructor. There were also some assistants including Chong Chae-Wung, but they seemed to take 2 or 3 year training and open their own clinic or change the specialty. In Severance Medical School Oh Kyung-Sun, who had graduated Louisville Medical School in 1907 and had been specialized in dermatology including venereal disease, was appointed as instructor in 1913. He got a training in dermatology and venereal disease in Tokyo Imperial University Faculty of Medicine in 1916, and established the dermato-genito-urology department there the next year. He gave an American style clinical instruction and Park Chu-Poong entered there for the first time as assistant in 1919. Then a few students such as Lee Young-Jun, Lee Hak-Song, who studied in Tokyo Imperial University Faculty of Medicine, left some works in the field of dermatology and urology. Kim Ul-Sung and Yun Yu-Son worked there as instructor and about 20 surgeons got a training there. The dermatourology department of Kyungsung Imperial University Faculty of Medicine was established in 1928 and Hirota of Kyungsung Medical College was appointed as chief professor. Oh Won-Sun, who assisted Hirota, resigned as Isiwata was commissioned. Kitamura was substituted for Hirota in 1939. Koreans of this department usually left after finishing there training as assistant or vice assistant, but Choi Jae-Wi, who had entered as vice assistant in 1935, working there for 13 years, finally got a appointment of instructor. But he had to resigned the very day, and opened a clinic in downtown. There were 8 Korean assistants dismissed after only 1 year working. As mentioned above, the urology of Korea started as dermatology including venereal disease. Lee Hak-Song, a graduate of Severance Union Medical School in 1932, taking his training in the department of dermatology-urology of Tokyo Imperial University Medical School, returned home and gave patient care and student education mainly in urology field. In Kyungsung Imperial University Faculty of Medicine Choi Ja-Wi, who graduated in 1935 and entered the dermatology department, separated urological surgery from dermatology when Seoul National University College of Medicine was organized after the Liberation. The works of these two figures are very monumental in the early history of urology in Korea.

Dr. Choi Myung-Hak the First Modern Korean Anatomist / 의사학

Though it is known that the concept of anatomy was introduced in the age of Three Kingdoms, anatomy in modern sense meaning was introduced in late Chosun Dynasty by western missionary doctors. From that time on the lecture of anatomy was not given by anatomist until early 1910s. The first Korean anatomist of medical school graduates was Choi Myung Hak, graduated from Severance Union Medical College(SUMC) in 1926. He was born in 1898 at Ham Heung(Ham Gyung Nam Do Province), and entered SUMC in 1922 and graduated in 1926. He was in charge of anatomy for two years after graduation, and then he went to Kyoto Imperial University Medical College(KIUMC) and researched under the direction of Dr. Ogawa in the field of experimental embryology and histology. He returned to Korea in 1930 and then became a lecturer in January 1931. His Doctorial thesis was receipted by KIUMC on April 18th 1932. So he became the first Korean Doctor of anatomy. He promoted to professor in February 1933. His publications can be seen in Folia Anatomica Japonica. In 1934 he became a councillor of the Japanese Association of Anatomist. He resigned SUMC because of some kind of problem of the school. From that time on Chung, Il-Chun who was appointed as a lecturer in 1934, was in charge of department of anatomy.