Chronic endometritis diagnosed using a cut-off of ≥5 CD138 plasma cells significantly affects the reproductive outcomes of frozen embryo transfer: a case-control study.

Objective: To investigate the clinical significance of a diagnosis of chronic endometritis (CE) made using a diagnostic cut-off of ≥1 or ≥5 CD138 plasma cells per high power field (HPF) in asymptomatic patients undergoing in vitro fertilization (IVF) with frozen embryo transfer (FET). Material and Methods: In this retrospective case-control study, 1,865 patients underwent freeze-all-IVF treatment between January and December 2019, with 419 undergoing endometrial biopsies at oocyte retrieval. Of the 419 biopsy-patients, 301 have since undergone first FET. The processed endometrial biopsies of the 301 patients underwent immunohistochemical (IHC) examination with anti-CD138 to count CD138+ plasma cells per HPF. CE diagnosis was defined as 0 CD138 plasma cells (control-group), ≥1 CD138 plasma cells (CEcontrol-group) or ≥5 CD138 plasma cells (CEdisease-group) per HPF. Results: Twenty-six (8.6%) patients were retrospectively diagnosed having ≥1 CD138 plasma cells, and five patients (1.7%) having ≥5 CD138 plasma cells (CEdisease-group) per HPF. The live birth and pregnancy loss rates of the three groups were 52.7% and 27.9%, 53.8% and 26.3% and 20.0% and 66.7%, respectively. The antral follicle count (AFC) of the three groups were 15.0 (9.0-22.0), 10.5 (7.75-15.25), and 6.0 (5.0-14.0), respectively. Conclusion: Asymptomatic patients diagnosed with CE with ≥5 CD138 plasma cells per HPF, had the lowest live birth and highest pregnancy loss rates, with these patients also having significantly reduced AFC.

Diagnostic Value of MiR-125b as a Potential Biomarker for Stage I Lung Adenocarcinoma.

BACKGROUND: We aimed at exploring biological functions of differentially expressed miRNAs during carcinogenesis, to identify miRNAs dysegulations involved in DNA repair mechanisms, and to evaluate potential of miRNAs as prognostic and diagnostic biomarkers for early lung adenocarcinomas (LAC). METHODS: We obtained 21 LAC and paired adjacent normal formalin-fixed, paraffinembedded lung tissues from patients who underwent curative resection for stage I LAC. We compared expression levels of eight miRNAs involved in the DNA repair mechanism between LAC and adjacent tissues. RESULTS: Expressions of Hsa-miR-9-5p, hsa-miR-24-3p, hsa-miR-125a-3p, hsa-miR- 125b-5p, hsa-miR-155-5p, and hsa-let-7a-5p were significantly up-regulated in stage I LAC tissues compared with those in the adjacent tissues. In addition, expressions of hsa-mir-9-5p, hsa-mir-24-3p, hsa-mir-125a-3p, hsa-mir-125b-5p, and hsa-mir-155-5p were significantly up-regulated in stage Ia LAC tissues, whereas expressions of hsa-mir- 125a-3p and hsa-mir-125b-5p were significantly up-regulated in stage Ib LAC tissues. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis revealed that AUROC of hsa-mir-125b- 5p was 0.875 (P < 0.001). CONCLUSION: Expression of hsa-mir-125b-5p could be used to distinguish LAC from adjacent tissues. Our result suggests that hsa-mir125b-5p can be a prognostic and diagnostic biomarker for LAC.

High FDG uptake predicts poorer survival in locally advanced nonsmall cell lung cancer patients undergoing curative radiotherapy, independently of tumor size.

OBJECTIVES: Despite radical radiotherapy and chemotherapy (CT), the prognosis of locally advanced nonsmall cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is poor. New prognostic indicators are being looked forward to improve the survival. [18F]-fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) uptake on PET/CT has been observed as a prognostic marker mainly in early-stage disease. Our aim was to examine the prognostic value of FDG uptake in locally advanced NSCLC. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Between 2009 and 2011, 103 NSCLC patients underwent disease staging using FDG PET/CT before conformal radiotherapy. Thoracic radiation was administered at a daily fraction of 2 Gy. Total dose was prescribed according to the tumor response against CT. All patients underwent CT. Survival was estimated using the Kaplan-Meier method. RESULTS: The median age of the patients was 59 years (range 39-83). The median follow-up time was 22.63 months (range 6-48.03 months). There was a statistically significant difference in overall survival (OS) between the low (<10.7) and high (≥10.7) standardized uptake value (SUVmax) groups (p = 0.006) on univariate analysis (3-year OS was 42% in the low (<10.7) and 23% in the high (≥10.7) SUVmax groups). On multivariate analysis with determining tumor size, tumor SUVmax provided additional significant prognostic information on OS (HR 1.046; 95 % CI 1.009-1.085, p = 0.015). CONCLUSIONS: FDG uptake has predictive value in locally advanced NSCLC, independently of tumor size.