Evaluation of smoking genotoxicity in Turkish young adults.

BACKGROUND: For the past few decades, it has been widely known in developed countries that tobacco is dangerous, but it is still insufficiently realized how big these dangers really are. AIMS: To determine and evaluate micronuclei (MN) frequencies of young smokers and nonsmokers in three different tissues (peripheric blood lymphoctes, buccal mucosa, and exfoliative urothelial cells) at the same time. MATERIALS AND METHODS: MN assay was performed on buccal mucosa, urothelial cells, and peripheric blood lymphocyte samples obtained from 15 healthy male smokers (>5 pack-years) and 15 healthy male nonsmoker controls who had not been exposed to any known genotoxic agent. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS USED: The statistical differences between smoker and nonsmoker groups were calculated by using student t test. The differences between smoker-group tissues were compared by ANOVA. RESULTS: It was found that MN frequency (mean value ± standard deviation) in oral mucosa cells from smokers and controls were 1.20 ± 0.22% and 0.26 ± 0.10%; in urothelial exfoliative cells, 1.29 ± 0.28% and 0.12 ± 0.08%; in peripheric blood lymphocytes, 1.53 ± 0.23% and 0.38 ± 0.12%, respectively. The mean MN frequencies in buccal mucosa, urothelial exfoliative cells, and peripheric blood lymphocytes were significantly higher in smokers than in those of controls (P<0.05). All tissues were affected from smoking, but the most destructive effect was seen in urothelial cells of smokers (P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: Our data showed that cigarette smoke is a DNA damage causitive agent on exfoliative buccal mucosa and urothelial cells and peripheric blood lymphocytes of young smokers, but it has most destructive effect on urothelial cells.

Papillon-lefevre syndrome with congenital hepatic fibrosis.

Papillon Lefevre syndrome (PLS) is a rare autosomal recessive disorder, which is characterized by palmar-plantar hyperkeratosis, periodontitis, and premature loss of dentition. We report a 16 years old girl with PLS. The patient presented at 08 years of age with complaints of corn on the feet and hands, and failure to thrive. On examination, her upper primarily canines were loose, she had severe periodontitis, eruption of permanent teeth, diffuse eritematous and hyperkeratotic palms and soles that suggested the syndrome. During the follow-up, the patient was diagnosed to have congenital hepatic fibrosis (CHF) when she was 16 years old, while she was being investigated for the etiology of her splenomegaly and pancytopenia. We report a patient with PLS associated with CHF, an association that has not been previously described. Abbreviations-HbsAg: Hepatitis B virus surface antigen, Anti Hbs: Antibody against Hepatitis B surface antigen, Anti Hbc IgM: Antibody against Hepatitis B cor antigen immunglobulin M, Anti dsDNA: Antibody against double stranded deoksiribonucleic acid, Anti HCV: Antibody against Hepatit C virus, Anti HIV: Antibody against human immun deficiency virus, AST: Aspartat amino transferase, ALT: Alanin amino transferase, Gamma-GT: Gamma glutamyl transferase, LDH: Lactate dehydrogenase & MRI: Magnetic resonance imaging.

Y chromosome microdeletions in Turkish infertile men.

AIMS: To detect the frequency and types of both chromosomal abnormalities and Y chromosome microdeletions in infertile men attending to our university intracytoplasmic sperm injection ICSI/IVF centre and fertile control subjects in our patient population. SETTINGS AND DESIGN: A total of 50 infertile men who were referred to IVF center of Meram medical faculty were selected for the molecular azospermia factor (AZF) screening program. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Karyotype analysis and polymerase chain reaction amplification using 15 Y-specific sequence-tagged sites of AZF region were done. RESULTS: The total prevalence of chromosomal abnormalities was found to be 10% (5/50), including 4 patients with numerical and 1 patient with structural abnormalities. Overall, 4 of the 50 patients tested (8%) exhibited deletions of the Y chromosome, 3 of them being azospermic and 1 of them oligospermic men. The frequency of the microdeletions in subgroups with azospermia and oligozoospermia was found to be 10.7% (3/29) and 4.7% (1/21) respectively. Microdeletions of AZFb and AZFc regions were detected in all of the 4 patients. Neither AZFa nor AZFd microdeletions were indicated. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggest that one must know whether there is a genetic cause for male infertility before patients can be subjected to ISCI or testicular sperm extraction (TESE)/ISCI treatment.