Primary sclerosing encapsulating peritonitis: a case report.

BACKGROUND: Sclerosing encapsulating peritonitis is a rare condition with a typical macroscopic appearance, with fibrocollagenous membrane enclosing loops of the small intestine, causing intestinal obstruction. Unexplained recurrent abdominal pain, obstruction, and a large array of other possible clinical signs and symptoms make sclerosing encapsulating peritonitis a diagnostic challenge. CASE PRESENTATION: A 48-year-old man of Persian ethnicity was admitted multiple times to the emergency surgery department due to recurrent sudden abdominal pain and chronic obstruction without significant findings in medical history or clinical evaluation. Computed tomography was positive for proximal jejunal dilatation and duodenojejunal flexure stenosis due to internal mesenteric hernia. Exploratory laparoscopy, followed by laparotomy, confirmed thick membrane-like fibrous tissue with complete small intestinal loop envelopment. Extensive membrane excision and adhesiolysis was performed, but no mesenteric herniation was found. Early postoperative paralytic ileus with introduction of low-dose steroid therapy, based on histopathological and immunological results, confirming type III sclerosing encapsulating peritonitis, was completely resolved. CONCLUSION: Sclerosing encapsulating peritonitis is a rare and difficult-to-diagnose condition, further divided into primary and secondary sclerosing encapsulating peritonitis, on the basis of underlying etiology, dictating treatment modality and prognosis. Intraoperative diagnosis and surgical treatment are mandatory, besides a wide variety of abdominal computed tomography scans, inconclusive results, and clinical presentations. There are so far no known specific markers for the diagnosis of sclerosing encapsulating peritonitis.

Assessing the reproductive toxicity of some (con)azole compounds using a structure-activity relationship approach.

The present research investigates the study of a set of 27 (con)azoles and their reproductive toxicity. (Con)azoles are used as fungicides and herbicides in agriculture for treatment of fruits, vegetables, cereals, and seeds, or as human antimycotic therapeutics. According to EEC Directive 91/414, active substances used in plant protection products must undergo reproductive toxicity testing. Reproductive toxicity is a complex biological endpoint, which includes many different biological processes and, therefore, it can only to a limited extent be assessed by a single quantitative structure-activity relationship (QSAR) model. The proposed SAR models are built using unsupervised methods, such as hierarchical clustering, principal component analysis and self-organizing maps, with the aim of studying the similarity relationships between structures. The molecular structures are represented with a set of topological and structural descriptors. The models showing clusters, closest neighbours or outliers may support the categorization and the classification of (con)azoles as potential reproductive toxicants.