Analysis of risk factors for recurrence and prognosis of adhesive small bowel obstruction.

OBJECTIVE: The recurrence of adhesive small bowel obstruction (ASBO) limits the effectiveness of clinical treatments, making its significant clinical issues. Clinical features, perioperative parameters, and postoperative outcomes were retrospectively analyzed, to provide basis for screening the high risk factors in patients of recurrent ASBO. METHODS: A review of medical records of patients with ASBO at Chongqing University Central Hospital, from 1 January 2015 to 31 December 2019 was conducted. We compared the clinical characteristics, intra-operative findings, and history surgery of ASBO "relapse-free" and relapsing patients. Logistic proportional hazard model was used to identify recurrence risks. RESULTS: Based on specified inclusion and exclusion criteria, a total of 279 patients were included in this study. Participants' mean age was 63.0 (13.1) years; 49.4% (138 of 279) of them were male. Using multivariate Logistic regression analysis, the history of emergency abdominal surgery (hazard ratio, 0.241, p < 0.0001) was significantly associated with recurrence, as were multiple abdominal surgeries (hazard ratio, 0.250, p < 0.0001) and diabetes mellitus (hazard ratio, 0.182, p < 0.0001). Patients with recurrence, who underwent surgery had longer operative times, blood loss, and a higher incidence of wound complications than those without recurrence. CONCLUSION: The history of emergency abdominal surgery, multiple abdominal surgeries, and diabetes mellitus independently increased the chances of ASBO recurrence. Patients with ASBO recurrence had a higher incidence of postoperative complications.

Effectiveness of intraoperative radiotherapy vs hypofractionated postmastectomy radiotherapy for early stage breast cancer: A protocol for systematic review and meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND: Radiotherapy is one of the essential components of breast cancer treatment. It destroys the remaining cells in the chest area after breast cancer surgery and is useful for reducing the necessity of mastectomies. As a single dose of radiation at the time of breast conserving surgery, intraoperative radiotherapy delivers radiotherapy directly and accurately to the tumor itself or the tumor bed whilst delivering minimal dose to the surrounding normal tissues. Hypofractionated postmastectomy radiotherapy with shorter and more convenient hypofractionated dose schedules might help to treat more patients and reduce cost. We will conduct a comprehensive systematic review and meta-analysis to compare the effectiveness of these 2 therapies in the management of early stage breast cancer. METHODS: Four English databases (PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library, and Web of Science) and 3 Chinese databases (China National Knowledge Infrastructure, China Science and Technology Journal Database, and Chinese Biomedical Literature Database) will be searched from inception of databases to December 2020 without language limitation. Two reviewers will independently conduct selection of studies, data extraction and management, and assessment of risk of bias. Any disagreement will be resolved by the third reviewer. Review Manager 5.3 (The Cochrane Collaboration, Software Update, Oxford, UK) will be used for data synthesis. Cochrane risk of bias assessment tool will be used to assess the risk of bias. RESULTS: This study will provide a systematic synthesis of current published data to compare the effectiveness of intraoperative radiotherapy vs hypofractionated postmastectomy radiotherapy for early stage breast cancer. CONCLUSIONS: This systematic review and meta-analysis will provide clinical evidence for the effectiveness of intraoperative radiotherapy vs hypofractionated postmastectomy radiotherapy for early stage breast cancer, and inform our understanding of the value of intraoperative radiotherapy and hypofractionated postmastectomy radiotherapy for early stage breast cancer. STUDY REGISTRATION NUMBER: INPLASY2020110115.

Low-grade slightly elevated and polypoid colorectal adenomas display differential ß-catenin-TCF/LEF activity, c-Myc, and cyclin D1 expression.

AIM: To comparatively investigate the cellular and molecular characteristics of low-grade slightly elevated adenomas and polypoid adenomas. METHODS: Colorectal tumors were collected from 24 patients with slightly elevated adenomas and 23 patients with polypoid adenomas. Five commonly mutated genes (APC, BRAF, KRAS, NRAS, and PIK3CA) were selected for mutational analysis. Paraffin-embedded tumor sections were used to calculate the apoptotic index (AI) and Ki-67 labeling index (KLI). Two pure colorectal epithelial cell lines were created by pooling the slightly elevated and polypoid tumors. Western blots, luciferase assays for ß-catenin-T-cell factor protein/ß-catenin-lymphoid enhancer factor (ß-catenin-TCF/LEF)-driven transcriptional activity, and caspase activity assays were conducted on the two cell lines. RESULTS: Slightly elevated lesions showed a significantly lower APC mutational frequency and a significantly higher KRAS mutational frequency (both P < 0.05). Slightly elevated lesions showed a significantly lower AI (P < 0.05). ß-catenin and ß-catenin-TCF/LEF-driven transcriptional activity was significantly upregulated in slightly elevated lesions (both P < 0.05). In slightly elevated lesions, c-Myc was significantly downregulated, while cyclin D1 was significantly upregulated (both P < 0.05). ß-catenin-TCF/LEF-driven transcriptional activity was negatively correlated with c-Myc (ρ = -0.78). Slightly elevated lesions displayed significant Bcl-2 and Bcl-xL upregulation (both P < 0.05) along with significant decreases in caspase-9 and caspase-3 activity (both P < 0.05). c-Myc was negatively correlated with Bcl-2 and Bcl-xL (ρ = -0.74 and -0.78, respectively). CONCLUSION: The lower apoptotic activity of low-grade slightly elevated adenomas can be partly attributed to upregulated ß-catenin pathway activity and downregulated c-Myc expression.

Effects of polymorphisms in six candidate genes on phenytoin maintenance therapy in Han Chinese patients.

AIM: The present study aimed to investigate the associations between variants in pharmacokinetic- and pharmacodynamic-related genes with the dosages, concentrations and concentration-dose ratios (CDRs) of phenytoin (PHT). METHODS & RESULTS: Eleven genetic polymorphisms in the six candidate genes were detected in 269 epileptic patients under maintenance PHT monotherapy by real-time PCR and PCR-RFLP. Results of a bivariate analysis demonstrated that among tested polymorphisms, carriers of the variant CYP2C9*3 tended to require significantly lower maintenance PHT dosages than wild-type carriers (p < 0.0001); on the other hand, carriers of the variants CYP2C9*3 or CYP2C19*3 revealed significantly higher CDRs than wild-type carriers (p < 0.004). In a further multivariate analysis, variants in SCN1A, CYP2C9, CYP2C19 and ABCB1 genes were significantly associated with CDRs of PHT under adjustment of age, gender and epilepsy classifications (adjusted r(2) = 20.07%). CONCLUSION: The results of present study indicated that polygenic analysis may provide useful information in PHT therapy optimization.

Polytrauma with thoracic and/or abdominal injuries: experience in 1 540 cases.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the early diagnosis and treatment of polytrauma patients with thoracic and/or abdominal injuries. METHODS: The data of all polytrauma patients with thoracic and/or abdominal injuries during the past 10 years were studied retrospectively. RESULTS: In the present study, there were 1 540 polytrauma patients, accounting for 65.0% of all 2 368 trauma patients. Of these patients, 62.4% were in shock state on admission. The operative rates were 15.0% (181/1 206) and 79.9% (612/766) in patients with thoracic and abdominal injury (P<0.01), 5.2% (39/758) and 31.7% (142/448) in patients with blunt and penetrating chest trauma (P<0.01), and 72.45% (359/496) and 93.7% (253/270) in patients with blunt and penetrating abdominal injuries (P<0.01), respectively. To deal with abdominal injury, angioembolization was performed in 43 cases, with 42 cured. The overall mortality rate was 6.2%. And in the blunt and penetrating subgroups, the mortalities were 7.9% (75/950) and 3.6% (21/590), respectively (P<0.01). Most patients died from exsanguination. CONCLUSIONS: The first "golden hour" after trauma should be grasped, since the treatment in this hour can determine greatly whether the critically-injured victim could survive. Prompt diagnosis and proper treatment contribute more greatly to the survival of the victim than the severity of injury.

Penetrating cardiac wounds: principles for surgical management.

Stab wounds are the main type of penetrating cardiac injury in China and they have a fairly good prognosis when the patient receives expeditious and appropriate management. The objective of this study is to present the experience of managing the patients with penetrating cardiac injuries. A retrospective study involving 82 cases with penetrating wounds of the heart in the past 16 years was carried out. Stab wounds accounted for 86.58% of this series (71 of 82 patients). All 82 cases were treated operatively. The amount of preoperative infusion as fluid resuscitation for shock was less than 1,000 ml in 65.85% of the present study. Only in three patients was preoperative pericardiocentesis performed, yielding a false-negative result in one. Six patients sustaining cardiac arrest soon after arrival were subjected to emergency room thoracotomy (ERT), and five of them survived. The overall survival rate was 96.34%. One patient died of exsanguination due to injury of multiple chambers; of the remaining 2 deaths after operation 1 was associated with abdominal injuries and the other with failure of cerebral resuscitation. From the experience reported in this study, early establishment of diagnosis and prompt thoracotomy against time are the fundamental factors affecting the outcome of penetrating cardiac injuries. Preoperative massive transfusion and pericardiocentesis are not advocated.