Retrospective Evaluation of Bone Metastases in Patients With Thyroid Malignancy: A Single-Center Experience.

Background Thyroid cancer is one of the five most common cancers causing bone metastasis. If there is an increase in serum thyroglobulin-antithyroglobulin levels in differentiated thyroid cancer or calcitonin levels in medullary thyroid cancer, patients should be evaluated for recurrence and distant metastasis. The skeleton is the second most common site of distant metastasis in thyroid cancer after the lung. Bone metastases cause pain, fractures, and spinal cord compression, severely reducing the quality of life. They are associated with poor prognosis. Bone metastases severely reduce the quality of life. This study aimed to retrospectively evaluate the diagnosis and follow-up of patients with thyroid cancer with bone metastases diagnosed at our center. Methodology A total of 1,390 patients diagnosed with thyroid malignancy at our center between 2010 and 2023 were reviewed retrospectively. The study included 27 patients with differentiated and medullary thyroid cancer who had bone metastases. Results Of 27 patients, 19 (70.4%) had differentiated and eight (29.6%) had medullary thyroid cancer. Papillary thyroid cancer constituted 22.2% (n = 6) and follicular thyroid cancer constituted 14.8% (n = 4) of the cases. Papillary carcinoma follicular variant, oncocytic, and poorly differentiated thyroid cancer were diagnosed with similar frequency, each accounting for 11.1% (n = 3). It was found that vertebrae were most commonly involved, followed by the pelvis, sternum, costae, femur and patella, shoulder and humerus, cranium, and scapula. The five-year survival rate was 72%, and the 10-year survival rate was 53%. Conclusions The number of patients with papillary cancer was the highest, but the rate of bone metastases was the lowest in this group. The highest rate of bone metastases was found in patients with poorly differentiated, oncocytic, medullary, follicular, and papillary cancer, respectively. The results obtained in this study reveal the necessity and importance of bone metastasis evaluation in patients with thyroid cancer.

COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy in Turkey: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

This systematic review and meta-analysis aims to estimate the prevalence of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccine hesitancy in Turkey, which can aid future health policies and strategies. A comprehensive search was conducted on various databases using keywords related to COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy in Turkey. Quality assessment was performed using Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) checklist for prevalence studies. Data extraction was conducted. The random effect model (DerSimonian and Laird method) was used in pooled prevalence data analysis (95% confidence interval [CI]). A total of 1,072 articles were identified. After removing duplicates and excluding articles, 61 articles remained for bias assessment. Among these, 19 articles with low risk of bias were included in the review and meta-analysis. Total population included in the analysis was 15,164, vaccine hesitancy was 30.5% (95% Cl: 24.3-36.8%). Prevalence of the vaccine hesitancy was found to be 39.8% (95% Cl: 31.4-48.2%) in studies conducted before the initiation of vaccination, while in studies conducted after the commencement of vaccination, hesitancy was 20.4% (95% Cl: 12.9-28%). We suggest conducting high-quality studies in different populations to understand the level of vaccine hesitancy, as many of the previous studies have mainly focused on healthcare workers and students, and rest were community-based studies, which have generally shown high bias. Also, we suggest that early vaccination can reduce vaccine hesitancy.

Prognostic value of aldehyde dehydrogenase 1 (ALDH1) in invasive breast carcinomas.

Aldehyde dehydrogenase 1 (ALDH1) has been identified as a marker of cancer stem cells in breast cancer (BC). Recent studies showed that ALDH1 expression is correlated with poor prognostic parameters and worse clinical outcome in BC. We evaluated ALDH1 expression by immunohistochemistry in a series of 217 invasive BCs and investigated the correlation between ALDH1 expression and clinicopathological parameters, molecular subtypes (luminal A, luminal B, human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 [HER2] type, and triple-negative BC [TNBC]), and patient survival. There was a significant association between ALDH1 expression and tumor grade (p < 0.001), i.e., the expression of ALDH1 was higher in high-grade tumors. ALDH1 expression was significantly associated with estrogen and progesterone receptor (ER and PR) negativity (p < 0.001) and HER2 positivity (p = 0.001). ALDH1 expression ratios were higher in HER2 type and TNBC. There was a statistically significant correlation between ALDH1 negativity and luminal A subtype (p < 0.001). The overall and disease free survival were shorter in ALDH1+ tumors, although without statistical significance. We confirm that ALDH1 is a potentially important, poor prognostic factor in BC, associated with high histological grade, ER/PR negativity and HER2 positivity. For more accurate results, ALDH1 expression should be evaluated in larger case series including various types/subtypes of BC.