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The increasing demand for scar treatments has led to various innovative methods. This paper presents two cases involving the treatment of distinct scar types using a single monopolar microneedle radiofrequency (SMNR) device. The first case involved a 52-year-old male with 2-cm linear depressed facial scar of unknown etiology. The patient underwent two sessions of SMNR spaced two weeks apart and showed scar improvement after four weeks. The second case involved a 35-year-old male presenting with a combination of icepick and boxcar acne scars on both cheeks. He received seven SMNR treatments every two weeks and showed scar improvement after 12 weeks. In both cases, scar improvement was achieved through subcisions of fibrous septa combined with dermal remodeling using microneedle radiofrequency. This case report shows that SMNR is an effective and safe modality for treating various types of scars, including acne scars, with minimal downtime and no significant adverse effects

OBJECTIVE: To establish the safest approach to needle electrode insertion into the flexor pollicis longus (FPL) regarding possible needle injury to the superficial radial nerve (SRN) or radial artery by ultrasonography. METHODS: We evaluated 54 forearms of 27 healthy subjects. Three levels were defined in the forearm. Level 1 is the junction of the middle and distal third of the forearm, level 3 is the midpoint of forearm length, and level 2 is the midpoint between two levels. At each level, the distance between the most prominent point of the radius and the SRN (region A), the distance between the SRN and the radial artery (region B), and the depth from the skin surface to the FPL were measured. RESULTS: The distance of region A was 1.20+/-0.41 cm in level 1, 1.62+/-0.45 cm in level 2, and 1.95+/-0.49 cm in level 3. The distance of region B was 1.02+/-0.29 cm in level 1, 0.61+/-0.24 cm in level 2, and 0.37+/-0.19 cm in level 3. The depth from the skin surface to the FPL was 0.92+/-0.20 cm in level 1, 1.14+/-0.26 cm in level 2, and 1.45+/-0.29 cm in level 3. CONCLUSION: The safest needle insertion point to the FPL is the middle of the forearm within approximately 0.8 cm from the most prominent point of the radius. We recommend that the needle is inserted at the above point perpendicular to the skin surface until the needle meets the FPL at a depth of approximately 1.45 cm from the skin surface.
Electrodes ; Electromyography ; Forearm ; Needles ; Needlestick Injuries ; Radial Artery ; Radial Nerve ; Radius ; Skin

OBJECTIVES: Recently, comparison of drug responses on gene expression has been a major approach to identifying the functional similarity of drugs. Previous studies have mostly focused on a single feature, the expression differences of individual genes. We provide a more robust and accurate method to compare the functional similarity of drugs by diversifying the features of comparison in gene expression and considering the sample dependent variations. METHODS: For differentially expressed gene measurement, we modified the conventional t-test to normalize variations in diverse experimental conditions of individual samples. To extract significant differentially co-expressed gene modules, we searched maximal cliques among the co-expressed gene network. Finally, we calculated a combined similarity score by averaging the two scaled scores from the above two measurements. RESULTS: This method shows significant performance improvement in comparison to other approaches in the test with Connectivity Map data. In the test to find the drugs based on their own expression profiles with leave-one-out cross validation, the proposed method showed an area under the curve (AUC) score of 0.99, which is much higher than scores obtained with previous methods, ranging from 0.71 to 0.93. In the drug networks, we could find well clustered drugs having the same target proteins and novel relations among drugs implying the possibility of drug repurposing. CONCLUSIONS: Inclusion of the features of a co-expressed module provides more implications to infer drug action. We propose that this method be used to find collaborative cellular mechanisms associated with drug action and to simply identify drugs having similar responses.
Biomarkers, Pharmacological ; Drug Repositioning ; Gene Expression Regulation ; Gene Expression* ; Gene Regulatory Networks ; Methods ; Transcriptome*

Nocturnal stridor, a high-pitched breathing sound during sleep, is one of the respiratory signs indicating airway narrowing. A 70-year-old man experienced life-threatening nocturnal stridor following tracheostomy decannulation after medullary infarction and vocal cord paralysis. This rare case highlights the importance of evaluating risk of sleep apnea and vocal cord function pre-decannulation to prevent serious complications.

Nocturnal stridor, a high-pitched breathing sound during sleep, is one of the respiratory signs indicating airway narrowing. A 70-year-old man experienced life-threatening nocturnal stridor following tracheostomy decannulation after medullary infarction and vocal cord paralysis. This rare case highlights the importance of evaluating risk of sleep apnea and vocal cord function pre-decannulation to prevent serious complications.

Nocturnal stridor, a high-pitched breathing sound during sleep, is one of the respiratory signs indicating airway narrowing. A 70-year-old man experienced life-threatening nocturnal stridor following tracheostomy decannulation after medullary infarction and vocal cord paralysis. This rare case highlights the importance of evaluating risk of sleep apnea and vocal cord function pre-decannulation to prevent serious complications.

Malakoplakia is an extremely rare granulomatous disease caused by infection and known to occur mostly in immune-compromised hosts. The most common site of involvement is the bladder. Patients with malakoplakia of the bladder present with multiple intravesical masses and are often misdiagnosed with bladder cancer. As a result, appropriate treatment is delayed. Here we report a case of a patient with malakoplakia of the bladder that was misdiagnosed as bladder cancer.
Humans ; Malacoplakia* ; Urinary Bladder Neoplasms* ; Urinary Bladder* ; Urinary Tract Infections

Endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress, unfolded protein response (UPR), and mitochondrial biogenesis were assessed following varying intensities of exercise training. The animals were randomly assigned to receive either low- (LIT, n=7) or high intensity training (HIT, n=7), or were assigned to a control group (n=7). Over 5 weeks, the animals in the LIT were exercised on a treadmill with a 10degrees incline for 60 min at a speed of 20 m/min group, and in the HIT group at a speed of 34 m/min for 5 days a week. No statistically significant differences were found in the body weight, plasma triglyceride, and total cholesterol levels across the three groups, but fasting glucose and insulin levels were significantly lower in the exercise-trained groups. Additionally, no statistically significant differences were observed in the levels of PERK phosphorylation in skeletal muscles between the three groups. However, compared to the control and LIT groups, the level of BiP was lower in the HIT group. Compared to the control group, the levels of ATF4 in skeletal muscles and CHOP were significantly lower in the HIT group. The HIT group also showed increased PGC-1alpha mRNA expression in comparison with the control group. Furthermore, both of the trained groups showed higher levels of mitochondrial UCP3 than the control group. In summary, we found that a 5-week high-intensity exercise training routine resulted in increased mitochondrial biogenesis and decreased ER stress and apoptotic signaling in the skeletal muscle tissue of rats.
Animals ; Body Weight ; Cholesterol ; Endoplasmic Reticulum ; Fasting ; Glucose ; Insulin ; Mitochondria ; Organelle Biogenesis ; Muscle, Skeletal* ; Phosphorylation ; Plasma ; Rats* ; RNA, Messenger ; Triglycerides ; Unfolded Protein Response*

No abstract available.
Bronchiolitis Obliterans* ; Bronchiolitis* ; Cryptogenic Organizing Pneumonia* ; Hepatitis C* ; Hepatitis*