Gastro-intestinal stromal tumours are uncommon malignancies of the gastro-intestinal tract, accounting for only 0.2% of all gastro-intestinal malignancies, but are the most common of abdominal sarcomas. Classically, they have been considered amenable only to early stage surgical intervention. Recent advances in targeted cancer therapies have led to the development of effective non-surgical trea...

The intestinal mucosa is constantly facing a high load of antigens including bacterial antigens derived from the microbiota and food. Despite this, the immune cells present in the gastrointestinal tract do not initiate a pro-inflammatory immune response. Toll-like receptors (TLRs) are pattern recognition receptors expressed by various cells in the gastrointestinal tract, including intestinal ep...

The gastrointestinal tract harbors approximately 100 trillion bacterial cells that exist symbiotically to maintain the integrity of the intestinal mucosa and the gut immune system [1,2]. Intestinal homeostasis is achieved by the symbiotic relationship between the host immune system and these microbes. Disruptions of this homeostasis predispose the gastrointestinal tract to increased incidence o...

BACKGROUND Diagnosis of protein loss into the gastrointestinal tract using noninvasive techniques is challenging. In people, scintigraphy not only is a sensitive tool to confirm protein-losing enteropathy (PLE), but it also allows for localization of protein loss. HYPOTHESIS/OBJECTIVES To investigate the feasibility of 99m Tc-labeled human serum albumin (HSA) scintigraphy in dogs with PLE in ...

Iron absorption is a function of the gastro-intestinal mucosal epithelium. The normal non-anemic dog absorbs little iron but chronic anemia due to blood loss brings about considerable absorption-perhaps 5 to 15 times normal. In general the same differences are observed in man (1). Sudden change from normal to severe anemia within 24 hours does not significantly increase iron absorption. As the ...

In both humans and mice, the intestinal microbiota are essential for development of a mature immune system, and for maintaining immunological homeostasis in the intestinal tract. Although many hundreds of bacterial species colonize the mammalian gut, the balance between these species varies widely between individuals in a population. Importantly, the presence or absence of specific species of b...