BACKGROUND Pain is a common complaint after surgery and seems to be difficult to manage in children because of fear of complications of pain treatment or misconception that infants and small children do not feel pain at all or feel less pain. A survey reported that 40% of pediatric surgical patients experienced moderate or severe postoperative pain and that more than 75% had insufficient analge...

BACKGROUND The small bowel (SB) represents the most important dose-limiting structure in pelvic radiotherapy (RT). However, we observed that the majority of rectal cancer patients who received preoperative pelvic intensity modulated RT (IMRT) developed acute tenesmus without watery diarrhea. The objective of this study is to determine if the RT dose to SB affects the acute lower gastrointestina...

background: considering the ease of administration of capecitabne instead of infusional 5fu for concurrent  radiochemotherapy (rct) of rectal cancer, the use of capecitabine has increased significantly in our radiation oncology department in the past years. thus we decided to compare the safety and survival with these 2 drugs by a retrospective review. methods: files of all patients receiving r...

PURPOSE To investigate the dosimetric results and first clinical experiences with a new designed balloon applicator with adjustable catheters for endoluminal brachytherapy for patients with locally advanced rectal cancer not undergoing surgery. MATERIAL AND METHODS The applicator consists of an inflatable rectal balloon with six attached Foley catheters used as guidance for the inserted brach...

The majority of current models utilized for predicting toxicity in prostate cancer radiotherapy are based on dose-volume histograms. One of their main drawbacks is the lack of spatial accuracy, since they consider the organs as a whole volume and thus ignore the heterogeneous intra-organ radio-sensitivity. In this paper, we propose a dose-image-based framework to reveal the relationships betwee...

Epidemiological and experimental evidence indicates that aspirin can protect against colorectal cancer. Aspirin inhibits cyclooxygenase enzymes and blocks prostaglandin (PG) biosynthesis. Using rectal PGE(2) levels as a mucosal biomarker, we sought to determine the optimal aspirin dose that would significantly suppress PGE(2) levels for chemoprevention trials. We conducted a randomized, double-...

Group B streptococci (GBS) colonize the female genital and rectal tracts and can cause invasive infection in susceptible newborns. An optimally effective GBS vaccine should induce mucosal and systemic immunity. In this study, we investigate the local and systemic immune responses to GBS type III capsular polysaccharide (CPS) after mucosal vaccination of mice via intranasal, peroral, rectal, and...

PURPOSE Despite advances in rectal cancer treatment over the last decade, local control and risk of late side effects due to external beam radiation therapy (EBRT) remain as concerns. The present study aimed to investigate the efficacy and the safety of low-dose-rate endorectal brachytherapy (LDRBT) as a boost to neoadjuvant chemoradiation for use in treating locally advanced distal rectal aden...