A simple renal cyst invaded by infiltrating urothelial carcinoma mimicking a Bosniak Class IV renal cyst.

We report a 79-year-old woman with a left side simple renal cyst invaded by infiltrating urothelial carcinoma mimicking a Bosniak Class IV renal cyst. Computerized tomography has high accuracy for the diagnosis of renal cysts and urothelail carcinoma. But, in this case it was still difficult to distinguish a simple renal cyst with infiltrating urothelial carcinoma invasion from a Bosniak Class IV renal cyst on CT scan. The management of a Bosniak Class IV renal cyst and urothelail carcinoma is totally different. Therefore, we performed a left side nephroureterectomy. This patient will have regular follow-up with cystoscopy every 3 months for the first 2 y, every 6 months for the next 2 y, and then annually thereafter.

Giant seminal vesicle cyst resembling megaureter with hydronephrosis.

Seminal vesicle cysts combined with ipsilateral renal agenesis is a rare congenital anomaly. We report an extreme case whose image resembles megaureter and hydronephrosis. A standard nephrectomy was performed and spermatozoa with flattened, cuboidal, and pseudostratified epithelium was found microscopically. The diagnosis of seminal vesicle cyst was confirmed.

Macroaggregated albumin potentiates the hypoglycemic effect of microencapsulated islets in the fed state of streptozotocin-induced diabetic mice.

Prolonged postprandial hyperglycaemia was noted in streptozotocin-induced diabetic mice which had been treated intraperitoneally with 2000-3000 alginate-poly-L-lysine-alginate (A-P-A) microencapsulated rat islets. We hypothesized that the persistent postprandial hyperglycaemia was due to shortage of intracapsular calcium ion. In order to study the effect of encapsulated macroaggregated albumin (MAA) on the function of microencapsulated islets, we coencapsulated MAA and islets in A-P-A microcapsules which we implanted intraperitoneally into streptozotocin-induced diabetic mice. From binding study and Scatchard analysis, we found that MAA-containing A-P-A microcapsules had a lower calcium binding affinity 5.24 +/- 1.20 mM versus 2.35 +/- 0.86 mM, n = 12, p < 0.01) and a higher calcium binding capacity (14.34 +/- 1.22 micrograms/mg versus 7.24 +/- 0.82 micrograms/mg, n = 12, p < 0.01) than empty A-P-A microcapsules. After intraperitoneal transplantation of 2000-3000 microcapsules containing islets and encapsulated MAA, the basal and postprandial blood glucose levels of the treated diabetic mice were not significantly different from that of normal mice. The improvement of persistent postprandial hyperglycaemia in these treated diabetic mice was not due to the difference of food intake in amount. In conclusion, A-P-A microcapsules containing islets and encapsulated MAA functioned better than microcapsules containing islets alone in treating streptozotocin-induced diabetic mice. The former preparation restored both fasting and postprandial hyperglycaemia and put these treated diabetic mice into a cured status of diabetes.