Following infection withThe female reproductive tract is an immunologically unique site which must respond to a diverse array of sexually transmitted pathogens and must also be tolerant to allogeneic sperm and to conceptuses. Pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) is an acute clinical syndrome associated with the ascending spread of microorganisms through the female reproductive tract (80). PID encompasses a multitude of inflammatory conditions of the upper reproductive tract organs, with the majority of proven cases of PID being caused by Chlamydia trachomatis and Neisseria gonorrhoeae (gonococcus) (32), and coinfection with both pathogens is common.Neisseria gonorrhoeae is the etiologic agent of gonorrhea, and the organism infects the mucosal epithelia of the male urethra and the lower genital tracts (vagina/cervix) of women. Localized infection with gonococci leads to a mucopurulent cervicitis in women, but it is also frequently asymptomatic. However, in approximately 10 to 25% (7,26,70) of untreated individuals, infection may ascend into the upper reproductive tract to involve the endometrium, ovaries, myometrium, parametrium, and Fallopian tubes (FT) (32, 46). The host response to this ascending infection is manifested as endometritis, pelvic (tubal or ovarian) peritonitis, tubal abscess, and salpingitis in the FT, and all of these inflammatory conditions encompass the clinical syndrome of PID. Long-term sequelae that develop in individuals presenting with PID, such as chronic pelvic pain, tubal damage, and ectopic pregnancy (7,26,70), are recognized as important public health problems worldwide (32,46).The FT is essentially a muscular organ whose lumen is lined by columnar ciliated cells and secretory cells with microvilli (68), and it plays a critical role in mammalian reproduction, functioning as a channel and storage organ for spermatozoa, a collecting vessel for oocytes released from the ovaries, the site of fertilization and zygote formation, and a means for transporting the early embryo to the uterus (54, 68). It is recognized that salpingitis induced by gonococcal infection causes significant tissue damage in the FT, which is resolved by a process of repair by infiltrating fibroblasts that leads to scarring. These events cause functional impairment of the tubes and irreversible infertility (80). However, little is known of the molecular mechanisms involved in the early stages of infection of the FT by ascending gonococci that initiate the inflammatory response. Studying the pathogenesis of gonococcus-induced salpingitis has relied on the use of ex vivo human FT organ tube

These results indicate that TNF-alpha did not modulate steroidogenesis in cultured human GLCs. However, NF-kappaB was activated by TNF-alpha. Therefore the activation of NF-kappaB via the TNF-alpha pathway is likely associated with other preovulatory granulosa cell processes important for human ovarian function.

Traumatic event checklists typically ask respondents to indicate whether they have experienced particular types of potentially traumatic events (PTEs) and then sum these endorsements to gauge cumulative trauma exposure. However, the sum of these endorsements indicates the variety of PTEs respondents have experienced rather than the count of exposure events. The main objective of the present study was to explore the association between PTE count and variety to examine assumptions regarding the use of traumatic event checklists to measure cumulative trauma exposure. The limited empirical research suggests that count and variety are strongly associated; however, there may be variation in magnitude concerning whether participants' environments confer an increased or decreased risk of exposure. We present Life Event Checklist data from a large sample of Mexican and U.S. participants (n = 1,820), which allowed us to compare reports of count and variety. Count and variety were strongly correlated, Kendall's tau-b = .74, such that count accounted for 54.6% of the variance in variety. A negative binomial regression analysis revealed that this association was moderated by county and municipio homicide rate, used as a proxy for violent crime, but not by natural disaster history. Variety was more strongly associated with scores on the Posttraumatic Stress Checklist for DSM-5, Kendall's tau-b = .26, than was PTE count, Kendall's tau-b = .22, Fisher's z = −8.04, p < .001. Although there are challenges in estimating PTE counts, the present findings suggest that PTE variety is not a good proxy for cumulative trauma exposure.

Objective: The United States (U.S.) and Mexico have vastly different lifetime prevalence of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), despite similarly high rates of trauma exposure. To explain this disparate prevalence, we created the Perception of Trauma Difficulty Assessment Tool (PTDAT) to identify four social comparison effect types that inform perception of trauma difficulty (i.e., Upward Assimilation Effect, Downward Assimilation Effect, Downward Contrast Effect, Upward Contrast Effect) to determine whether there was a dominant effect type associated with respondents' perception of coping with trauma difficulty for a sample of U.S. Americans and Mexicans. We identified sociodemographic characteristics and the degree of trauma exposure that associated with PTSD, PTSD symptom severity, and functional impairment for each effect type. Method: This was a cross-sectional study of a sample of 898 U.S. Americans and 902 Mexicans. A chi-square test determined whether there was a dominant effect type for each national group. For each effect type, multiple regression analyses identified predictors of PTSD, PTSD symptom severity, and functional impairment. Results: For U.S. Americans, trauma exposure was a predictor for PTSD for effect type Upward Contrast Effect, when respondents contrasted from an excellent appraisal of most people by making a poor self-appraisal. For Mexicans, all effect types had predictors for PTSD, with trauma exposure being a predictor for all. Conclusions: These preliminary findings provide support to consider patients' social context as it informs their perception of their capacity to cope, which may maintain PTSD. Future research is needed to determine whether perceptions of trauma difficulty are stable over time. Clinical Impact StatementPeople socially compare their capacities to others constantly. To shed light on the disparate national PTSD prevalence, it was hypothesized that U.S. Americans and Mexicans socially compare their capacity to manage trauma difficulty differently. This study utilized a social comparison framework to identify how people with PTSD appraised their capacity to manage trauma difficulties similar to those that prompted their PTSD. This study identified predictors for U.S. Americans and Mexicans with PTSD who engaged in different social comparison effects that informed their perception of trauma difficulty. Findings are important to clinical practice because the identification of perception of trauma difficulty effect type may aid in the amelioration of PTSD symptoms.