Neoangiogenesis is essential for tumor development, invasion, and dissemination. The most potent of the cytokines associated with angiogenesis is vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF). The aim of the present study was to determine VEGF serum level in patients with salivary gland tumor. Using an ELISA kit, the circulating levels of VEGF in sera from 58 patients with salivary gland tumor and ...

Background: Breakdown of tolerance against the commensal microflora is believed to be a major factor in the pathogenesis of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Dendritic cells (DC) have been implicated in this process in various animal models, but data on human DC in IBD are very limited. Aim: To characterise plasmacytoid DC (PDC) and myeloid DC (MDC) in patients with active versus inactive IBD a...

It is becoming increasingly clear that psychosis occurs along a continuum. At the high end are formal psychotic disorders such as schizophrenia, and at the low-end are individuals who experience occasional psychotic symptoms, but are otherwise healthy (non-clinical psychosis, NCP). Schizophrenia has been shown to be marked by altered patterns of connectivity between brain regions, but it is not...

In sub-Saharan Africa, approximately 30 million pregnant women are at risk of contracting malaria annually. Nearly 36% of healthy pregnant women receiving routine antenatal care tested positive for Plasmodium falciparum HRP-II antigen in Ghana. We tested the hypothesis that asymptomatic HRP II positive pregnant women expressed a unique Th1 and Th2 phenotype that differs from healthy controls. P...

OBJECTIVE To examine the possible associations between Demodex folliculorum and a number of skin diseases. METHODS Standardized skin surface biopsy samples were obtained from the cheeks of 144 patients with histopathologically proven basal cell carcinoma (BCC, n = 27), squamous cell carcinoma (SCC, n = 28), melanoma (n = 23), discoid lupus erythematosus (DLE, n = 32), and rosacea (n = 34). Th...

OBJECTIVES Bipolar disorder and schizophrenia share common pathophysiological processes and may have similar perceptual abnormalities. Mismatch negativity (MMN) and P3a - event-related potentials associated with auditory preattentional processing - have been extensively studied in schizophrenia, but rarely in bipolar disorder. Furthermore, MMN and P3a have not been examined between diagnostic s...

Abstract Early maladaptive schemas (EMSs) are broad and pervasive themes regarding oneself one’s relationships with others originating from adverse childhood experiences. Although the concept of EMSs was initially developed for treatment personality disorders, associations a variety other mental disorders have been investigated. The goal present study to summarize analyze EMSs-disorder in studi...

BACKGROUND The number of inducible adhesion molecules known to be involved in cell-mediated allograft rejection is still increasing. In addition, recent data describe complement activation during acute humoral allograft rejection. The aim of this study was to assess whether specific molecules from either pathway are excreted into urine and whether they can provide useful diagnostic tools for th...

BACKGROUND We performed an observational study of laughter during seminaturalistic conversations between patients with dementia and familial caregivers. Patients were diagnosed with (1) behavioural variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD), (2) right temporal variant frontotemporal dementia (rtFTD), (3) semantic variant of primary progressive aphasia (svPPA), (4) non-fluent variant primary progre...

OBJECTIVES To estimate the impact of a sensory-motor- cognitive task on postural balance, in Parkinson disease patients (Hoehn and Yahr 2-3) and to investigate possible relationships between posturography and functional balance clinical scales. METHOD Parkinson disease patients (n = 40) and healthy controls (n = 27) were evaluated with fluency tests, Berg Balance scale, Mini Best test and sta...