(1) No increase in the incidence of GI NHL was found over a 9-year observation period; (2) nonrandom spatial distribution of new GI NHL cases was observed; (3) factors that significantly increased the risk of death in gastric cases were presence of B symptoms (RR = 3.3), clinical stage is more than II1 (RR = 3.0), age more than 72 years (RR = 2.4), and elevated serum lactate dehydrogenase (s-LDH) level (RR = 2.0); and factors that increased the risk of death in intestinal cases were presence of B symptoms (RR = 3.2), age more than 58 years (RR = 2.8), and clinical stage more than I (RR = 2.1); (4) factors that significantly increased the risk of relapse in gastric cases were male sex and no radiotherapy in primary treatment; and in intestinal cases were T-cell phenotype and no surgery in primary treatment; (5) surgical staging, as opposed to thorough noninvasive staging, did not improve staging accuracy and final outcome in localized gastric NHL.

During a 9-year-period, 50 cases of primary non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (NHL) of the thyroid gland were reported to a population-based lymphoma registry covering western Denmark giving an incidence of 2.06 x 10(-6) cases per year. The male:female ratio was 1:4, and the mean age was 72.8 years for women and 62.8 years for men. On histomorphological reclassification 83% of the cases showed a high grade and 17% a low grade morphology, 98% had a B-phenotype and 2% a T-phenotype. In at least 33 of the cases, primary NHL of the thyroid gland was preceded by Hashimoto's thyroiditis and at least 25 of the patients had a high grade NHL which was transformed from Hashimoto's thyroiditis through a low grade B-cell lymphoma of MALT type. The most frequent presenting symptoms were goitre (100%), hoarseness (57%), stridor/dyspnoea (55%) and dysphagia (45%); thirty-six percent of the patients were hypothyroid at the time of diagnosis. Seventy-six percent of the patients had localized disease (stages 1-2) and 24% had disseminated lymphoma (stages 3-4). Five year survival was 34.5% and 5 year cause-specific survival 46.2%. The following factors were associated with a poor prognosis: stage 3-4 disease, elevated S-urate, presence of hoarseness and age> 66 years. Morphological subtype did not correlate significantly with survival.

Summary Differences in genetic origin between nodal and extranodal diffuse large B‐cell lymphomas (DLBCL) exist. Using population‐based data from the registry of the Danish Lymphoma Group, the present study is the first to analyse clinical implications of nodal versus extranodal presentation of DLBCL. Of 4786 newly diagnosed non‐Hodgkin's lymphoma patients in a 16‐year period, 1575 (33%) had DLBCL. The annual incidence rate was 2·9 per 100 000; 40% were extranodal. The clinical profile of patients with extranodal DLBCL was different from the nodal DLBCL patients. Extranodal DLBCL was associated with older age and poorer performance score, but also lower tumour burden. In extranodal DLBCL, 51% of the cases were stage I and 36% were stage IV, whereas the patients were relatively equally distributed between the four stages in nodal DLBCL. For stage I patients, extranodal DLBCL was independently associated with poor survival (P = 0·003). In contrast, among stage IV patients those with extranodal DLBCL survived longer (P = 0·009). We conclude that there are important clinical differences between nodal and extranodal DLBCL. The addition of these clinical results to the existing aetiological and genetic data suggests that the distinction between nodal and extranodal DLBCL is not only pathogenetically but also clinically important.

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a b s t r a c tWe show that carry trade strategies resemble FX option strategies that sell out of the money puts on high interest rate currencies. Both strategies collect premiums to generate persistent excess returns that unwind sharply when volatility increases. We also show that the widely documented negative slope coefficient in regressions of exchange rate depreciation on forward currency premiums is an artifact of the volatility regime. In high volatility regimes, the so-called Fama regression produces a positive coefficient greater than unity. We finally document the existence of an intuitive co-movement between currency risk premiums and yield curve risk factors.

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The isolation of Borrelia burgdorferi flagella and an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) for detection of immunoglobulin G (IgG) and IgM to the B. burgdorferi flagellum are described. The diagnostic performance of the flagellum ELISA for serodiagnosis of Lyme disease was compared with the performance of a traditional whole cell B. burgdorferi sonic extract ELISA. We examined sera and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) from 56 patients with lymphocytic meningoradiculitis (Bannwarth's syndrome), the most frequent secondarystage manifestation of Lyme disease in Europe. Two hundred healthy individuals and patients with aseptic meningitis, encephalitis, Guillain-Barré syndrome, and syphilis served as controls. The flagellum ELISA was significantly more sensitive than the sonic extract ELISA. The diagnostic sensitivities were increased from 41.1 to 76.8% (P < 0.01) for IgG and from 35.7 to 67.9% (P < 0.05) for IgM detection in serum. The increase in sensitivity was most pronounced in patients with a short duration of disease (<20 days after onset). The diagnostic specificity increased for IgG detection but was almost unaltered for IgM. The flagellum ELISA did not improve the diagnostic sensitivity of measuring antibodies to borreliae in CSF, most likely owing to the low level of unspecific antibodies in CSF compared with serum. The cross-reactivity of sera and CSF from patients with syphilis decreased significantly. The flagellum antigen of B. burgdorferi shows no strain variation, is easy to purify in sufficient quantity, and is therefore a suitable reference antigen for routine serodiagnosis of Lyme disease.

The symptomatic effect of pancreatic enzyme substitution therapy was examined in a 4-week double-blind crossover study. Twenty patients, 11 with and 9 without steatorrhoea, were examined. Pancreatic steatorrhoea was reduced from a median of 24 g/day to 10 g/day by the enzyme therapy (P less than 0.01). No significant pain reduction was found in either of the two groups, although there was a tendency to reduction in pain and analgetic consumption in the patients with steatorrhoea when treated with pancreatic enzymes. It is concluded that pancreatic steatorrhoea is still the only indication for pancreatic enzyme therapy.