Internal biliary fistula (IBF) is occurred spontaneously due to the biliary disease in most cases. Bilioenteric, biliobiliary, bronchobiliary, and vasculobiliary type of IBF have been reported in the literature. We herein describe our experience with an incidental cholecystojejunal fistula, a very rare type of bilioenteric fistula in laparoscopic cholecystectomy. A 61-year-old woman with several years' history of intermittent right upper abdominal pain was admitted to Soonchunhyang University Cheonan Hospital. Abdominal CT scan showed the pneumobilia in gallbladder with common bile duct dilatation. Endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography and endoscopic sphincterotomy were done. On operative findings, there was a cholecystojejunal fistula. We performed laparoscopic cholecystectomy and fistulectomy with jejunal partial resection. To our knowledge, this is the first report on incidental cholecystojejunal fistula uncombined with any other disease and was treated with laparoscopic procedure.
Abdominal Pain ; Biliary Fistula ; Cholangiopancreatography, Endoscopic Retrograde ; Cholecystectomy, Laparoscopic ; Chungcheongnam-do ; Common Bile Duct ; Dilatation ; Female ; Fistula* ; Gallbladder ; Humans ; Middle Aged ; Sphincterotomy, Endoscopic ; Tomography, X-Ray Computed

An 11-year-old, castrated male dog presented with a 3-month history of cough and depression. Auscultation revealed systolic murmur and thoracic radiographs showing enlargement of both the atrium and left ventricle. Echocardiography showed thickened mitral valve and moderate-to-severe left atrial enlargement. Additionally, M-mode echocardiography showed symmetric left ventricular wall thickening and systolic anterior motion of the mitral valve, while Doppler imaging revealed high velocity turbulent flow through the left ventricular outflow tract. Based on echocardiography, this case was diagnosed with hypertrophic obstructive cardiomyopathy. After 5 months, the dog was clinically static in radiography and echocardiography.
Animals ; Auscultation ; Cardiomyopathy, Hypertrophic ; Child ; Cough ; Depression ; Dogs ; Echocardiography ; Heart Ventricles ; Humans ; Male ; Mitral Valve ; Radiography ; Systolic Murmurs

An 11-year-old, castrated male dog presented with a 3-month history of cough and depression. Auscultation revealed systolic murmur and thoracic radiographs showing enlargement of both the atrium and left ventricle. Echocardiography showed thickened mitral valve and moderate-to-severe left atrial enlargement. Additionally, M-mode echocardiography showed symmetric left ventricular wall thickening and systolic anterior motion of the mitral valve, while Doppler imaging revealed high velocity turbulent flow through the left ventricular outflow tract. Based on echocardiography, this case was diagnosed with hypertrophic obstructive cardiomyopathy. After 5 months, the dog was clinically static in radiography and echocardiography.

Ischemic stroke is a medical emergency that requires precise diagnosis and prompt treatment. Nonetheless, it is essential to evaluate alternative conditions, such as seizure, peripheral neuropathy and malignancy, with special attention to lymphoma due to its variable clinical manifestations, imaging features, and prognosis. In this report, we present a case of a patient who initially exhibited symptoms and radiological findings considered as lacunar stroke but was ultimately diagnosed with diffuse large B cell lymphoma.

Background: Sleep apnea, characterized by interruptions in breathing during sleep, presents health risks and has been associated with various dietary patterns. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between dietary patterns, as measured by the Recommended Food Score (RFS), and the risk of sleep apnea, as assessed using the Berlin Questionnaire. Methods: A total of 11,586 adults from a general hospital in Korea were included in the analysis. Participants completed a questionnaire covering demographic factors, lifestyle behaviors, and dietary habits. Dietary quality was assessed using the RFS, while sleep apnea risk was evaluated using the Berlin Questionnaire. Logistic regression analysis was conducted to assess the impact of RFS on sleep quality, adjusting for potential confounding factors. Results: Higher RFS was negatively correlated with sleep apnea risk (odds ratio=0.91 [95% confidence interval, 0.82–1.00, P=0.048)]. Significant positive associations were observed between male sex, low education level, marital status, smoking, drinking, inactivity, high blood pressure, high waist circumference, high levels of triglycerides, and poor sleep quality. Hematologic markers such as C-reactive protein levels and glutamic pyruvic transaminase also displayed significant associations with sleep quality. Conclusions This study contributes to our understanding of the complex interplay between diet, lifestyle, metabolic health, and sleep quality. These findings underscore the importance of dietary interventions in managing sleep apnea and highlight avenues for further research.

The present study was undertaken to produce monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) against immunoglobulin (Ig) purified from black rockfish (Sebastes schlegeli Higendorf) serum using protein A, mannan binding protein, and goat IgG affinity columns. These three different ligands were found to possess high affinity for black rockfish serum Ig. All of the Igs purified eluted at only 0.46 M NaCl concentration in anion exchange column chromatography and consisted of two bands at 70 kDa and 25 kDa in SDS-PAGE; they also had similar antigenicity for MAbs to Ig heavy chain in immunoblot assays. Therefore, black rockfish Ig is believed to exist as a single isotype within serum. The MAbs produced against Ig heavy chain reacted specifically with spots distributed over the pI range from 4.8 to 5.6 with a molecular weight of 70 kDa on two dimensional gel electrophoresis immunoblot profiles.
Animals ; Antibodies, Monoclonal/*biosynthesis/immunology ; Chromatography, Affinity/veterinary ; Electrophoresis, Gel, Two-Dimensional/veterinary ; Immunoblotting/veterinary ; Immunoglobulin Heavy Chains/immunology ; Immunoglobulin Light Chains/immunology ; Immunoglobulins/blood/*immunology ; Perciformes/blood/*immunology

Obesity provokes many serious human diseases, including various cardiovascular diseases and diabetes. Body mass index (BMI) is a highly heritable trait that is broadly used to diagnose obesity. To identify genetic loci associated with obesity in Asians, we conducted a genome-wide association study (GWAS) of a population of Korean adults (n=6,742, age 40~60 years) and detected six BMI risk loci (TNR, FAM124B, RGS12, NFE2L3, MC4R and FTO) having p<1x10(-5). However, in the replication study, only melanocortin 4 receptor gene (MC4R) (rs9946888, p=4.58x10(-7)) was replicated with marginal significance (p<0.05) in the second cohort (n=5,102, age 40~60 years). This study indicates that each locus associated with BMI has very weak genetic effect.
Adult ; Asian Continental Ancestry Group ; Body Mass Index ; Cardiovascular Diseases ; Cohort Studies ; Genetic Loci ; Genome-Wide Association Study ; Humans ; Obesity ; Receptor, Melanocortin, Type 4

Human bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) expanded in vitro exhibit not only a tendency to lose their proliferative potential, homing ability and telomere length but also genetic or epigenetic modifications, resulting in senescence. We compared differential methylation patterns of genes and miRNAs between early-passage [passage 5 (P5)] and late-passage (P15) cells and estimated the relationship between senescence and DNA methylation patterns. When we examined hypermethylated genes (methylation peak > or = 2) at P5 or P15, 2,739 genes, including those related to fructose and mannose metabolism and calcium signaling pathways, and 2,587 genes, including those related to DNA replication, cell cycle and the PPAR signaling pathway, were hypermethylated at P5 and P15, respectively. There was common hypermethylation of 1,205 genes at both P5 and P15. In addition, genes that were hypermethylated at P5 (CPEB1, GMPPA, CDKN1A, TBX2, SMAD9 and MCM2) showed lower mRNA expression than did those hypermethylated at P15, whereas genes that were hypermethylated at P15 (MAML2, FEN1 and CDK4) showed lower mRNA expression than did those that were hypermethylated at P5, demonstrating that hypermethylation at DNA promoter regions inhibited gene expression and that hypomethylation increased gene expression. In the case of hypermethylation on miRNA, 27 miRNAs were hypermethylated at P5, whereas 44 miRNAs were hypermethylated at P15. These results show that hypermethylation increases at genes related to DNA replication, cell cycle and adipogenic differentiation due to long-term culture, which may in part affect MSC senescence.
Bone Marrow Cells/*metabolism ; *DNA Methylation ; Gene Expression Profiling ; Gene Expression Regulation ; Humans ; Mesenchymal Stromal Cells/*metabolism ; MicroRNAs ; Molecular Sequence Annotation ; Primary Cell Culture ; Promoter Regions, Genetic ; Reproducibility of Results ; Signal Transduction ; Telomere Shortening

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Colorectal cancer incidence among patients aged ≤50 years is increasing. This study aimed to develop and validate an advanced colorectal neoplasm (ACRN) screening model for young adults aged <50 years in Korea. METHODS: This retrospective cross-sectional study included 59,575 consecutive asymptomatic Koreans who underwent screening colonoscopy between 2003 and 2012 at a single comprehensive health care center. Young Adult Colorectal Screening (YCS) score was developed as an optimized risk stratification model for ACRN using multivariate analysis and was internally validated. The predictive power and diagnostic performance of YCS score was compared with those of Asia-Pacific Colorectal Screening (APCS) and Korean Colorectal Screening (KCS) scores. RESULTS: 41,702 and 17,873 subjects were randomly allocated into the derivation and validation cohorts, respectively, by examination year. ACRN prevalence was 0.9% in both cohorts. YCS score comprised sex, age, alcohol, smoking, obesity, glucose metabolism abnormality, and family history of CRC, with score ranges of 0 to 10. In the validation cohort, ACRN prevalence was 0.6% in the low-risk tier (score, 0–4), 1.5% in the moderate-risk tier (score, 5–7), and 3.4% in the high-risk tier (score, 8–10). ACRN risk increased 2.5-fold (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.8–3.4) in the moderate-risk tier and 5.8-fold (95% CI, 3.4–9.8) in the high-risk tier compared with the low-risk tier. YCS score identified better balanced accuracy (53.9%) than APCS (51.5%) and KCS (50.7%) scores and had relatively good discriminative power (area under the curve=0.660). CONCLUSIONS: YCS score based on clinical and laboratory risk factors was clinically effective and beneficial for predicting ACRN risk and targeting screening colonoscopy in adults aged <50 years.
Adult ; Cohort Studies ; Colonoscopy ; Colorectal Neoplasms ; Comprehensive Health Care ; Cross-Sectional Studies ; Early Detection of Cancer ; Glucose ; Humans ; Incidence ; Korea ; Mass Screening ; Metabolism ; Multivariate Analysis ; Obesity ; Prevalence ; Retrospective Studies ; Risk Assessment ; Risk Factors ; Smoke ; Smoking ; Young Adult

PURPOSE: Astrocyte elevated gene-1 (AEG-1) plays important roles in tumorigenesis such as proliferation, invasion, metastasis, angiogenesis, and chemoresistance. We examined the expression of AEG-1 in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). METHODS: Eighty-five samples were collected from patients with HCC who underwent surgery and were histopathologically confirmed to have HCC. Two independent pathologists, experienced in evaluating immunohistochemistry and blinded to the clinical outcomes of the patients, reviewed all samples. They determined AEG-1 expression semiquantitatively by assessing the percentage of positively stained immunoreactive cells and staining intensity. Clinicopathological data were analyzed in association with prognosis. RESULTS: The association was estimated by univariate and multivariate analyses with Cox regression. Tumor size (hazard ratio [HR], 2.285; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.175-4.447; P = 0.015), microvascular invasion (HR, 6.754; 95% CI, 1.631-27.965; P = 0.008), and AEG-1 expression (HR, 4.756; 95% CI, 1.697-13.329; P = 0.003) were independent prognostic factors for overall survival. Those for disease-free survival rate were tumor size (HR, 2.245; 95% CI, 1.282-3.933; P = 0.005) and AEG-1 expression (HR, 1.916; 95% CI, 1.035-3.545; P = 0.038). The cumulative 5-year survival and recurrence rates were 89.2% and 50.0% in the low-expressing group and 24.5% and 82.4% in the high-expressing group, respectively. CONCLUSION: The results suggest that AEG-1 overexpression could serve as a valuable prognostic marker in patients with HCC.
Astrocytes* ; Carcinogenesis ; Carcinoma, Hepatocellular* ; Disease-Free Survival ; Humans ; Immunohistochemistry ; Multivariate Analysis ; Neoplasm Metastasis ; Prognosis ; Recurrence