Pericardiectomy for Constrictive Pericarditis with or without Cardiopulmonary Bypass.

Aim: We aim to access the effect of pericardiectomy for constrictive pericarditis with or without cardiopulmonary bypass. Methods: This was a review of pericardiectomy for constrictive pericarditis. Results: Cardiopulmonary bypass is actually an important maneuver to attain complete relief of the constriction. The short additional time of cardiopulmonary bypass during the procedure has very little effect on the risk of morbidity of the main operation. Conclusion: Incomplete pericardiectomy perhaps was the cause of postoperative remnant constriction and high diastolic filling pressure leading to multiorgan failure. Complete pericardiectomy (removal of phrenic-to-phrenic and the postero-lateral and inferior wall pericardial thickening) using cardiopulmonary bypass should be the routine for total relief of the constriction of the heart.

Clinical stages of recurrent hepatocellular carcinoma: A retrospective cohort study.

BACKGROUND: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the second leading cause of cancer-related death worldwide, and has relatively high recurrence rates. Few studies have been published on the clinical stages of recurrent HCC. AIM: To assess the applicability of the Barcelona Clinic Liver Cancer (BCLC) staging for recurrent HCC and the need to establish clinical stage criteria for recurrent HCC. METHODS: The clinicopathological data of 81 patients with recurrent HCC who were admitted to the Hospital of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region from January 2013 to December 2017 were collected. The patients were divided into three groups according to the BCLC staging system as follows: (1) Group A with BCLC stage A, 51 patients; (2) Group B with BCLC stage B, 14 patients; and (3) Group C with BCLC stage C, 16 patients. The median time to tumor recurrence and the median overall survival were compared. RESULTS: The median time to tumor recurrence in groups A, B, and C was 16 ± 1.5 mo, 10 ± 2.8 mo, and 6 ± 0.5 mo, respectively, with a statistically significant difference among them (χ 2 = 70.144, P < 0.05); no statistically significant difference was noted between group A and group B (χ 2 = 2.659, P > 0.05), although there were statistically significant differences between group A and group C and between group B and group C (χ 2 = 62.110, and 19.972, P < 0.05). The median overall survival in groups A, B, and C were 42 ± 5.1 mo, 22 ± 3.1 mo, and 13 ± 1.8 mo, respectively, with a statistically significant difference among them (χ 2 = 38.949, P < 0.05); there were statistically significant differences between group A and group B, group A and group C, and group B and group C (χ 2 = 9.577, 37.172, and 7.183, respectively; P < 0.05). CONCLUSION: There are different prognoses in recurrent HCC patients according to the BCLC staging. Therefore, BCLC staging is applicable to recurrent HCC and it is essential to formulate clinical stage criteria for recurrent HCC.

[Application of Ligasure vessel sealing instrument in laparoscopic hepatectomy for liver cancer].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the indication and effect of the application of Ligasure vessel sealing instrument in laparoscopic hepatectomy for liver cancer. METHODS: Eleven patients with liver cancer undergoing laparoscopic hepatectomy were analyzed for the tumor size and location, operation time, volume of intraoperative bleeding, postoperative hospital stay and short-term clinical outcomes. RESULTS: All the operations were performed successfully in the 11 cases. All the tumors were less than 7 cm in diameter, locating at the segments II, III, V, VI and VII. The mean operation time was 91 min (80-126 min), and the intraoperative blood loss averaged 82 ml (20-200 ml). The average postoperative hospital stay of the patients was 8 days (7-9 days). No complications were observed in these cases. CONCLUSION: Ligasure vessel sealing instrument in laparoscopic hepatectomy is applicable in cases of perimeter liver cancer. This instrument can decrease the operation time, reduce the intraoperative blood loss and postoperative hospital stay with good safety and minimal invasiveness.

Altered gene expression profiles of NIH3T3 cells regulated by human lung cancer associated gene CT120.

CT120, a novel membrane-associated gene implicated in lung carcinogenesis, was previously identified from chromosome 17p13.3 locus, a hot mutation spot involved in human malignancies. In the present study, we further determined that CT120 ectopic expression could promote cell proliferation activity of NIH3T3 cells using MTS assay, and monitored the downstream effects of CT120 in NIH3T3 cells with Atlas mouse cDNA expression arrays. Among 588 known genes, 133 genes were found to be upregulated or downregulated by CT120. Two major signaling pathways involved in cell proliferation, cell survival and anti-apoptosis were overexpressed and activated in response to CT120: One is the Raf/MEK/Erk signal cascades and the other is the PI3K/Akt signal cascades, suggesting that CT120 might contribute, at least in part, to the constitutively activation of Erk and Akt in human lung cancer cells. In addition, some tumor metastasis associated genes cathepsin B, cathepsin D, cathepsin L, MMP-2/TIMP-2 were also upregulated by CT120, upon which CT120 might be involved in tumor invasiveness and metastasis. In addition, CT120 might play an important role in tumor progression through modulating the expression of some candidate "Lung Tumor Progression" genes including B-Raf, Rab-2, BAX, BAG-1, YB-1, and Cdc42.

Cloning and characterization of human IC53-2, a novel CDK5 activator binding protein.

We have identified IC53-2, a human homologue of the rat C53 gene from a human placenta cDNA library (GeneBank Accession No.AF217982). IC53-2 can bind to the CDK5 activator p35 by in vitro association assay. IC53-2 is mapped to human chromosome 17q21.31. The IC53-2 transcript is highly expressed in kidney, liver, skeletal muscle and placenta. It is abundantly expressed in SMMC-7721, C-33A, 3AO, A431 and MCF-7 cancer cell lines by RT-PCR assay. Stable transfection of IC53-2 cDNA into the hepatocellular carcinoma SMMC-7721 cell remarkably stimulates its growth in vitro. The above results indicate that IC53-2 is a novel human gene, which may be involved in the regulation of cell proliferation.

[Expression of human novel gene CT120 in lung cancer and its effects on cell growth].

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVE: A novel membrane-associated gene CT120 was isolated from chromosome 17p13.3 locus in our laboratory. Its mRNA was not expressed in human normal lung tissues, but was abundant in human lung cancer cell line SPC-A-1. This study was designed to investigate the differential expression patterns of CT120 in different lung cancer and noncancerous tissues using immunohistochemistry and to explore the effects of ectopic expression and overexpression of CT120 on cell growth in vitro and in vivo. METHODS: A polypeptide at the C-terminus of CT120 was selected by bioinformatics, then was synthesized and conjugated to KLH (a high molecular carrier). The chicken anti-CT120 antibody IgY was prepared with the synthesized antigen and was used to determine the different expression patterns of CT120 in various tumor cell lines and in lung cancer and noncancerous tissues. The effects of ectopic expression of CT120 on NIH/3T3 cell growth were investigated through colony formation analysis. The effect of overexpression of CT120 on the cell growth of A549 was analyzed using growth curve assay and tumor formation assay of transfected cells in nude mice. RESULTS: The novel gene CT120 expressed in various tumor cell lines and expressed remarkably higher in lung cancers than in noncancerous tissues as well as normal lung tissues. Also, it promoted the proliferation of NIH/3T3 and A549 cells in vitro and in vivo. CONCLUSION: CT120 gene may be a novel candidate gene closely related to lung carcinogenesis.